


Lessons Learned

by Miri1984



Series: This Ship Is Cursed [2]
Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Blow Jobs, Kink Negotiation, Light Dom/sub, M/M, tick those ones off the acheivements, well looks like I'M expanding my tag list
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-23
Updated: 2019-07-15
Packaged: 2020-05-18 15:21:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 20,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19337233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: Companion Piece to Tell Me How Not to Care or Teach Me To Lie. Alternating POV. Fragmented thoughts and moments. Oh. And smut.Quick note: this fic was finished before it was made Canon that Zolf was biromantic asexual (YES BEN THANK YOU). While I know there are wide definitions of how asexual people engage with sex I will fully acknowledge I myself am NOT ace and didn't write this fic with ace people in mind. I still think it works with ace definitions broadly. As always, interpret how you need to but note the content warnings.





	1. Chapter 1

Oscar Wilde, standing in the waiting room of the temple of Hephaestus, ponders the exact nature of solitude.

He’s used to operating on his own, or at least, detached from official channels. Before London, before Paris, only a handful of people had even known of his true work. Oscar was a socialite, a sometime playwright, a nuisance, a dalliance. Fundamentally, a distraction.

Which was fine. He had freedom of movement, access to all levels of society, friends (associates) colleagues (covers) lovers (leverage). He enjoyed his life, enjoyed knowing just that little bit more than everyone around him, enjoyed being instrumental in moving the pieces of the game around the board, a nudge here, a kiss there, a carefully worded article _there._

Surrounded at all times, in all ways, by _people._

Now?

Now, Oscar Wilde stands in the waiting room of the temple of Hephaestus, a list of names of men and women who have been lying to him for years cycling through his brain, the ragged edges of a month of enforced magical fatigue still clutching at his chest, the unexpected respect and concern for a goblin who refuses to give up on his friends _who refused to give up on Oscar_ churning in his gut like undigested food, and asks himself, what does it mean, really, to be completely alone?

The High Priest shuffles out with a crate, looks Wilde up and down and nods, once. “The Goblin said you’d come,” he says.

“No one else knows what’s in here?”

The Priest shakes his head and hands Wilde the papers. “Don’t know what you’re going to do with it.”

Oscar tucks the papers into his jacket and sucks air in through his nose.

“No,” he says. “Nor do I really.”

#

He makes enquiries. He’s hobbled by lack of magic, no teleport will work on him any longer, and he needs to get to Japan. He sits at his desk in Damascus and sorts through the last few weeks of reports. Oscar has had feelers out ever since Prague, looking for a certain dwarf, knowing that the rest of the LOLOMG would eventually want to know if he was safe, and some of his leads have come through.

Coincidence, or fate, that Zolf Smith has taken work on a ship that does the route between Alexandria and Tokyo. Possibly a trap, laid specifically for Wilde to walk into, or perhaps a stroke of luck. In either case, worth investigating, and Wilde books passage on a stage coach the following day.

#

He sees Zolf in the rigging, when he boards. He hadn’t been entirely sure that he’d gotten the right ship but sailors love to gossip and sailors love to flirt and sailors love to drink and Oscar didn’t even need to touch any of them to hear about the weird sea legged dwarf on the Aurora.

He honestly doesn’t look any different. His hair is longer. He seems more at home here, on the sea, than he ever did on land, although Oscar remembers him still and staring out a window in a wheelchair with tears on his cheeks and the weight of a world spanning disaster on his shoulders.

He looks away before Zolf spots him, wonders if he will recognise Oscar. Wonders if he’ll pity him, brought to this, booking mundane passage on a mundane ship, looking something other than perfect. Stores his crate in the hold and sets himself up in his cabin. It’s more than a month, to Japan. He’ll have time to speak to Zolf Smith and ask him for help. He’ll have time to work up the courage, to put back some of the facade.

#

He is surprised by the kiss. It’s a pleasant surprise, at least at first, before Oscar’s entire body starts to sing with a contact that he didn’t understand he missed like a limb. It’s been so long since he’s been touched like this it takes effort not to enfold Zolf in his arms and draw him down. Zolf’s beard scratches against Oscar’s mouth and his hand curls at Oscar’s waist and Oscar wants to drown in it, be consumed by it. The feeling is so intense that he starts to shake when Zolf makes a sound in the back of his throat that goes straight to Oscar’s dick.  _Gods_ but he hasn’t wanted something this much for years but something goes wrong and Zolf pushes him back, anger flashing in his eyes even as his chest heaves.

The need doesn’t dissipate, but Zolf’s anger sparks instinctive defenses, and Oscar runs a thumb over his lips, and Oscar _doubles down._

It’s a relief, when he can feel Zolf settle back into despising him. Something like solid land under his feet, after being adrift for too long.

#

The night after the kiss, he pulls the gag they used on him in Paris out from where he has kept it the last few months (remembers the gentle fingers of Hamid removing it, the almost concern in Sasha’s voice as she asked if he was all right) and ties it securely. He needs his magic, but he knows the dreams well enough now to know he cannot endure them in silence.

He is still vain enough not to be humiliated by the pity of the rest of the crew.

He wakes up screaming silently, for five more nights. On the sixth, he sleeps through the night undisturbed.

#

Zolf Smith is one of the only people he has ever met who is capable of surprising him. On the deck, in the rain, for the first time in decades, Oscar watches him walk away and realises he is out of his depth.

#

They still need to reach Japan, and Oscar is bored. Oscar is bored and he can’t help but pick at Zolf like a scab over a sore. He sees him on deck, in the rigging, on lookout in the bow, and the scowl doesn’t shift when their eyes meet, but there is something else in them that Oscar has seen in the eyes of too many people for him not to recognise it.

It worries him.

It has never worried him before.

#

It’s having had to sing, again, that breaks him. That’s what he tells himself at least. Tapping magical healing in the old tongue brings up the past, makes him remember _home_ as something more tangible than _where the next job is._ It makes a crack in his heart, a wedge that is Zolf shaped, a needy gaping hole that is like a vortex that will latch onto the closest thing to an actual connection Oscar has made since he was a boy.

He’s lost, he knows that. He lost when he first decided to seek Zolf out. But he has a choice how he weathers that loss, and he pulls Zolf to him because if he’s cracked and broken he can at least have something to show for it.

Zolf kisses like the sea in a storm and Oscar runs his hands over his chest, fingers tangling in the coarse hair there, revelling in the feel of him, the heat of him, the solidity and actuality of another person in his space.

“What do you want?” Zolf says again, and Oscar doesn’t hesitate, pulls Zolf around so he’s on the cot next to him.

“You,” Oscar says, and sinks to his knees on the floor in front of him, hands working at Zolf’s belt. Zolf helps him and Oscar takes him in his mouth, revelling in the soft groan that he hears.

Oscar is _good_ at this, Oscar has always been good at this, Oscar knows how to work his tongue and use his fingers to bring out sounds like _that,_ and Zolf’s fingers smooth over his hair and touch his cheeks and he can hear him murmuring praise that shouldn’t make Oscar shiver like that, shouldn’t make his chest hurt and his dick throb but he’ll take it, take the familiar along with the strange, take the arch in Zolf’s hips as he comes with a grunt down Oscar’s throat and swears.

Oscar doesn’t get up. He’s hard and aching and full of need but he doesn’t move to touch himself until Zolf tips his chin and kisses him again, taking Oscar’s hand in his and moving it towards his dick. Oscar undoes his pants and lets Zolf wrap his own hand around Oscar’s, almost weeps at how good  it feels to finally touch, to find the rhythm he needs, with Zolf’s hand around his, hot and calloused and solid and _beautiful_. Zolf cups his cheek as their hands move and Oscar does not close his eyes, keeps them fixed on Zolf’s until he spills between them, shuddering.

“Perfect,” Zolf murmurs, and pulls him close for another kiss. Oscar is still gasping and his cheeks are wet. Zolf smooths the tears away and pulls him down, encircling him in his arms. “It’s all right,” he says, as Oscar begins to shake. “I’ve got you,” he says, as Oscar tries to curl in on himself. “Shh, no it’s all right. You’re safe. You did so well.”

Oscar knows intellectually why he is crying, why it feels like he’s been cracked open and drained, but he can’t stop, he can’t make himself stop _he lost he gave in and now he can’t crawl back._

Zolf is still smoothing his hand over Oscar’s shoulders and he sucks in deep, shuddering breaths as Zolf continues to murmur.

He doesn’t know how long it takes for the tears to slow and finally stop. It feels like seconds. It feels like forever. But Zolf doesn’t let go.

 


	2. Negotiations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I've not written any D/S stuff before now so I'm being deliberately vague here while still trying to make it clear that they have WORKED THIS OUT, whatever happens is consensual etc etc. Please let me know if I've made any massive mistakes.

He wakes up in a cot that isn’t his with an armful of Oscar Wilde.

Zolf has been drunk many, many times in his life but he’s never felt this level of disconnect before, this level of having to sort his memories into coherency when the base memory, the thing that happened, was so far out of the realm of comprehension that his brain has simply refused to deal with it.

He remembers _the feel of Wilde’s lips around his dick, the aching sweetness of Wilde’s submission, the absolute, utter rightness of his words as Wilde sobbed in his arms, the knowledge that he was doing what was needed, what would help_ and then his brain whites out with the utter impossibility of it all.

That cannot have happened.

Except that Wilde is sleeping the sleep of the dead, utterly boneless and relaxed in his arms.

He doesn’t actually want to move. He’s comfortable, insomuch as he can be with an armful of human. He’s drained and he remembers, oh yes, he remembers that tight knot of tension in his gut being loosened expertly by the mouth of the man in his arms and perhaps he shouldn’t remember that, not quite so vividly, not while he’s still pressed against warm, pliant flesh. 

Zolf swallows, and starts to disentangle himself, as slowly and carefully as he can possibly manage. Wilde is so soundly asleep, so carefree and relaxed, that Zolf has to stop, once he’s completely out of the cot, to admire it. He’s dishevelled, mouth red, still in his pants (which they hadn’t bothered to remove) one arm flung above his head so Zolf can trace the lines of his muscles, the dusting of hair under his arms, the long, leanness of his humanity.

He’s beautiful. 

Zolf feels the tight clench of doubt in his gut but he can’t let it take hold. He’s not an expert, but he knows Wilde gave him something last night, something that Zolf could easily use to break him as much as he needed it to be healed. 

He doesn’t want to break him.

Not any more.

He washes, quietly, at the basin. Dresses properly. Then comes back to Wilde and smooths a hand over his forehead, a slight suggestion (no compulsion) that he sleep a little longer. He isn’t sure that Wilde even needs it, so thoroughly is the man in sleep, but he knows that if he wakes and Zolf is gone any progress they may have made the night before will have been lost.

He comes back with food and Wilde hasn’t moved, so Zolf makes himself and Wilde sandwiches out of the bread and meat he’s salvaged and sits in the chair, chewing and watching until finally Wilde wakes.

There is a moment, Zolf is sure, where Wilde is convinced it didn’t happen, but the moment passes as soon as his eyes fall upon Zolf. They go guarded, but Wilde doesn’t otherwise seem afraid.

Zolf passes a sandwich to him. “You’re going to be hungry,” he says, voice as low and calm as he can make it. Wilde sits up, slowly, grimaces for a moment, then shakes his head and waves a hand.

The cot is made and Wilde is clean, but not dressed. He looks at Zolf with a carefully blank expression, as though he is waiting for permission.

Zolf feels a sharp throb of arousal, not helpful given how he woke up only recently. “You need to eat,” Zolf says, and Wilde brings the bread to his mouth and takes a bite, chewing slowly. Zolf feels a small surge of pride, at that.

Poseidon. What has he done?

Wilde finishes the sandwich and Zolf can see him gathering the tatters of himself back together as he does so. He gently dabs at his mouth when he’s done and looks back up at Zolf, more composed now. “Good,” Zolf can’t stop himself from saying, and the flush that spreads over Wilde’s cheeks is _lovely._

“Yes,” Wilde says. “Well.” 

Zolf chuckles. “Feeling a little better, then?”

Wilde lets out a shaky breath. Nods. “For a given value,” he says. “You’re the one with two stab wounds.”

Zolf smooths a hand over his stomach. “Dealt with, thanks to you,” he says. Silence could be awkward, but Zolf makes it not. If Wilde wants Zolf to leave and forget about this, he’ll understand. He hands Wilde water, which Wilde drinks.

“Do you need me to go?” Zolf asks, tone very deliberate and neutral, and Wilde looks up at him quickly, fear in his eyes. “Be honest,” Zolf says. 

The fear fades a little and Wilde considers it.

“I’d rather you didn’t,” he says, finally. Zolf nods.

“I’ll take it that hasn’t happened for you before.”

Wilde’s smile is dangerously close to the smile he would have given Zolf before, but there is an intimacy to it that overshadows the humour. “Not for me,” he says. 

“Are you all right?” 

“I’m... _fine,_ ” Wilde says, then his shoulders slump and he shakes his head. “I’m fine,” he says more softly. “You… don’t… you don’t have to. We don’t have to…”

“Be honest,” Zolf gently reminds him.

“I needed it,” Wilde says, although the words sound like they’ve been dragged from him. “Thank you for helping.”

“Do you think you’ll need it again?”

He lets air out in a rush. _“Gods_ yes."

Zolf’s mouth goes a little dry at that, but he covers it by taking a sip of water. “All right. Not exactly something I’m trained in, but I know we should lay down some ground rules if that’s going to happen.” 

Wilde nods.

“Let’s do that then,” he says, and his tone is business like.

#

It isn’t a complicated arrangement, in the end. Zolf hardly expected Wilde to turn around and treat him like a lover, treat _them_ like something out of the pages of a romance novel. He wouldn’t have wanted that, in any case. There isn’t a word to encompass what they are to each other emotionally, not yet, but the physical side of things, well. That’s easy enough to sort through.

As they talk, Wilde’s manner relaxes back into something far more familiar and Zolf can almost believe they’re discussing plans for how to get to deal with the Simulacrum again, not the best combination of safe words, or making sure Wilde tells him when he desperately needs to be fucked to maintain hold on his sanity. 

They sort it out. Wilde is a consummate administrator, after all and Zolf is used to rules and structure, has lived by them most of his life. 

When they’re done, Zolf gets up to leave and Wilde grins at him from the cot. “I hope I’m not the only person getting something out of this arrangement,” he says. 

“You didn’t hear me complaining,” Zolf replies, and Wilde’s laugh is almost giddy.

“I _did_ hear you do quite a lot of _other_ things.” And Zolf remembers babbling a stream of praise _(so good, so perfect, you take it so beautifully)_ remembers holding Wilde’s head to his crotch, thrusting upwards into wet, welcome warmth. Remembers the agonising crest of his climax.

Zolf chews at his cheek in an attempt not to smile, or give away exactly how well he remembers what sounds Wilde managed to pull from him and how precisely he did it. “Landfall in a few hours,” he says instead, and his voice is only a little rough. “I’ll leave you to get packed up. I need to talk to the captain about my severance package.”

Wilde rakes his eyes over him and grins again and Zolf can even find it in himself to be a little bit irritated by it. 

It feels good.


	3. Prioritising

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Looked up Okinoshima and it turns out it’s a sacred island. I know that in Alex’s universe the gods are Greek Pantheon but I figured there would still be some cultural differences between Japan and Europe, possibly even some other gods that we don’t know about yet, and Japan was never colonised by Eurpoeans in any case so I’m guessing in RQG world it’s pretty similar to how it would have been in ours. Presumably there is a Meritocrat being benevolent and stopping them from killing each other in feudal wars though. Basically we’re entering into unknown territory and it’s probably all going to be thrown out the window in a couple of weeks any way due to actual canon but WHO CARES WHEEEEEEE.

Oscar feels completely empty. Oh, in the back of his mind he can still understand, intellectually, that he is in the middle of the worst of times, that he has five hundred thousand different things he needs to do, that his mission could very well decide the fate of every sentient being on the planet, but as he watches Zolf leave his cabin his mind feels flat and calm, the storm that rages beneath the surface can’t reach high enough to unbalance him.

He knows it’s only a matter of time.

Once Zolf has gone he busies himself with packing. He feels the gentle rocking of the ship underneath him, hears every creak and groan of wood and rope and cloth and his mind is silent and still and at peace.

When he’s done he goes back up on deck. They can see land now, and Oscar leans on the railing next to some of the other passengers and simply watches the waves, feels the wind on the skin of his cheeks, and doesn’t worry about what’s to come.

He meets Zolf on the docks. Oscar raises an eyebrow at the fact that the dwarf is wearing boots, covering the impossibility of his legs, his hair has been trimmed and his beard is no longer trailing in two braids nearly to his waist, instead closely cropped to his chin. He looks different enough, in short, for the two of them not to draw attention wherever they go. Oscar isn’t well known in Japan, although he has been here before, but there is an advantage to being known as flamboyant and dazzling. Without the peacock coloured waistcoat and the orange socks and the boyish curls, Oscar is just an ordinary man.

He is still uncertain how he feels about that.

Zolf nods in approval when he sees Oscar and Oscar savours the warmth that blooms in his stomach at that simple gesture, smiling lazily back at Zolf as the rest of the crew manhandle his crate down the gangplank. The harbour master arranges a carriage for them, to take them and the killswitch to a branch of one of the lesser banks (not run by the Al-Tahans, no the Mitsuis are far enough away from Cairo and London to be independent and Oscar knows for a fact they have fewer meritocratic ties than most). 

In the carriage, Zolf looks mildly uncomfortable and keeps checking his boots.

“Are they going to spill out over the top?” Oscar asks and Zolf scowls up at him.

“It feels wrong,” he grumbles. “They shouldn’t be in… containers like this.”

“That’s an interesting name for boots.”

“Foot buckets,” Zolf mutters and Oscar snorts. “We’ll have to see if Poseidon gets angry with me for covering them up.”

“Out of curiosity, how did he react to you leaving, in Prague?”

Zolf looks up at him and for a moment Oscar thinks he’s going to wave it off and refuse to answer.

“We don’t have conversations,” Zolf says. “But I’ve still got legs, so I’m guessing whatever his plans are for me they didn’t involve a trip to Rome.”

“You think you’re following in the path he has set for you?” Oscar has never been religious, the gods are useful and, in the end, someone else’s problem. He has, until now, put his faith in the raw power of the meritocrats.

It’s difficult not to, when you’re face to face with something so gigantic, something with the power to shape sentient life by sheer force. He can remember the heat of Apophis’ gaze when he is cold, can know that he is an agent for something on earth with the capacity to match the powers of the heavens.

The idea that they might not be in control, that everything he has worked for for the past ten years may be uncertain…

His calm is threatened and he has to actively push those thoughts down. 

“I have a path,” Zolf is saying, and Oscar forces himself to focus on Zolf’s words. “If Poseidon decides it’s the wrong one, then he’ll let me know.”

“It must be nice,” Oscar says. “To have that sort of faith.”

“Nice is one word for it,” Zolf says, and Oscar doesn’t press it.

#

The Mitsuis give him a complicated vault for the killswitch. He gives authority for Grizzop, Sasha, Hamid and Azu via magical seal, and sends a telegram to Cairo, hoping that they will survive to receive it. So strange, to have so few people he can trust.

They stay at an inn in Shinjuku. Not ostentatious, but up market enough to be comfortable.

“We have one night here,” Oscar says, tossing his pack onto the tatami mats at the side of the room. “Then we’ll be on the road. The authorities assure me the road is clear and safe until Saitama, but they’ve also recommended a mercenary company so I suggest…”

Zolf is next to him, dealing with his own bag, not obtrusive in any way, but Oscar can smell the sea on him and he stops talking.

“You suggest?” 

Oscar sucks his teeth. “They’re sending two swordsmen here in the morning, we can see if they’re suitable.”

Zolf fixes him with a steady gaze. “Wilde?” he says. Oscar wets his lips. “What do you need?” 

“I don’t need anything,” Oscar says, and he doesn’t. He really doesn’t.

Zolf smirks at him. “Well you know where I am,” he says. 

Oscar narrows his eyes, then sets up his futon, pretending he can’t hear Zolf’s low chuckle.

#

In the morning, two silent swordsmen present themselves in the inn’s bar. Oscar interrogates them in Japanese as Zolf casts a zone of truth. They’re professionals, used to being hired to protect wealthy merchants travelling the road north to Niigata Province. There are several inns along the road and the trip really shouldn’t be difficult. When Oscar mentions their final destination, however, the woman shakes her head.

“We don’t go there,” she says, along with something else in Japanese that Oscar doesn’t catch.

“It’s a sacred place,” the man, Ebisu, says. “No outsiders are allowed.”

The woman, her name is Sasano, snorts. “No women, no foreigners,” she says and Oscar can tell she’s less than impressed with at least the first of the conditions. The man shoots a glare at her that she pretends not to notice.

“Are there ships?”

“We do not go there,” Ebisu says again. 

Oscar pinches his nose. “Fine,” he says. "You can get us as far as Joetsu. We’ll sort out what to do after that when the time comes.”

Zolf has been watching the back and forth of their conversation with a slight frown on his face. “Problem?” he asks.

“Okonishima is off limits to foreigners, apparently,” Oscar says. He is watching the woman, who still looks disgruntled. Ebisu’s manner, which up until now has been professional and unemotional, has gone stony faced. 

Zolf crosses his arms over his chest. “I wish I was surprised,” he says.

“Yes well it make sense for them to use the local customs to keep prying eyes away.”

“Best not to talk about it in front of these two,” Zolf says and Oscar agrees. There is something else behind Sasano’s eyes, something more subtle than Ebisu’s palpable disapproval.

“We’ll meet you at the north gates in three hours,” Oscar says then, in Japanese.

The mercenaries both bow and depart. Sasano gives them a last look from the door of the tavern, and Oscar lets out a breath, glancing at Zolf.

“Ulterior motives?” Oscar says.

Zolf wiggles his fingers. “They were telling the truth, when you asked them who they worked for. No connections to Barrett or the Meritocrats, or the Cult of Hades. Just regular mercenaries. Like I used to be.”

Oscar steeples his fingers and breathes in. “Something’s going on though,” he says. “We should be careful.”

They take their leave of the inn and take a carriage to the North Gates, where Sasano and Ebisu are waiting with horses and supplies. Zolf doesn’t look to happy at the prospect of riding the sturdy hill pony they acquired, but he mounts up easily enough. Oscar, who hasn’t ridden in years (a horse, any way), isn’t desperately keen either, but they’ve chosen to travel by a side route rather than the main road and the trails they’ll be on are not suited for carriages.

It’s only a half day to Saikama, and Oscar remembers keenly why he doesn’t ride horses when they pull up at the inn and he dismounts, wincing. The two swordsmen smirk at each other when they think he can’t see. He supposes he should let them have their fun.

The inn is a much smaller place than the one in Shinjuku, and they aren’t served a meal in their room this time. Instead they eat in the taproom and by the time they get to their shared room he is exhausted and in pain.

“Ugh, this is _not_ the kind of riding I was built for.”

“I’d heal you up,” Zolf says. “But then you’d just go through it all again tomorrow.”

“I’m well aware.” 

“Go to sleep, Wilde,” Zolf says, voice gruff, and there’s just enough of a hint of command in his voice to give Oscar a small shiver of pleasure.

He rolls onto his stomach on his bedroll and flutters his eyelashes at Zolf, who is struggling with his boots in a room with no chairs. “Yes _sir,”_ he says and Zolf growls under his breath, but Oscar can see the flush that spreads across his cheeks.

Zolf puts his boot down and leans forward. “Are you going to go to sleep?” he asks. “Or is there something else you need?” 

Oscar feels his breath catch in the back of his throat. Oh he _wants_ to say yes. He squirms slightly, grinding his hips into the mats beneath him, then winces as the pain in his buttocks and thighs reasserts itself.

“I’ll take it that’s a no then?” Zolf says, and Oscar sighs and waves a hand.

_Fine._


	4. Problems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plot getting in the way again.

There is something soothing about the mundanity of travel. Dwarves are more sturdy than humans and Zolf doesn’t have the same difficulties as Wilde with regards to riding, so he falls into the rhythm of it. They stop at small towns along the route to sleep the first two nights, and on both nights Wilde tests the boundaries. Zolf asks him if he needs anything, and Wilde says no, although on the third night Zolf notices he hesitates for a little longer.

They spend the fourth night in Saku, after winding down between mountains. It’s beautiful country, mossy, dappled green forests dotted with cherry trees in blossom. Far more richly colourful than the West Country even in Spring. The forest feels crowded, though, and Zolf misses being able to see the horizon.

In Saku Zolf asks Wilde if he needs anything and Wilde says no. They are sharing a tiny room in the only thing approaching an inn and Zolf won’t lie, he’s beginning to think Wilde is trying to win again.

Then again, they have almost no privacy and Zolf suspects Sasano at least is tracking the progress of their interactions with a keen and interested eye. 

He finds out exactly why that is when he’s shaken awake in the middle of the night. Sasano puts a finger to her lips, indicating Wilde and beckons him.

“I’m not leaving him here alone,” Zolf says, although he keeps his voice low. It doesn’t matter, since she won’t understand him in any case.

Except that she does.

“Don’t be foolish,” she breathes, in heavily accented English. “You trust me, I help you.”

“Help me do what?”

“Get to Okonishima without dying,” she says. 

“Your friend isn’t keen on that idea.”

“Ebisu is an idiot,” Sasano says. She makes a gesture. “All sword and no head.”

Zolf smirks. “Why don’t you want…” he indicates Wilde. 

“Also an idiot,” she says. “Can’t be quiet. Come on, we don’t have much time.”   


Zolf has a couple of choices, none of which are great, but Sasano wasn’t involved with the Meritocrats or the cult of Hades and Zolf can handle himself. He throws back the covers and pulls on his boots.

When he looks up Sasano is staring at him.

“Outside,” he says. “You can ask questions then.”

#

She takes him through the tiny town to an abandoned rice farm on its outskirts. It’s raining slightly, the cool air coming down from the mountains turning chill. Inside the farmhouse - just a single room with a raised wooden floor - its tatami mats shredded and filthy and chewed by rats. An older woman sits cross legged next to a covered lamp, waiting for him.

“You’re the Englishman who wants to get to Okonishima,” she says. 

“Yes,” he says. 

She nods into the shadows. “Hideto,” she says, and a young man comes forward. Even in the dim light of the lamp Zolf can see how haggard he looks, pale and drawn and terrified. His right arm ends in a stump and Zolf’s healing sense goes haywire. Something is  _ wrong  _ with him. Something fundamental and  _ horrible  _ and Zolf’s stomach churns in sudden nausea.

“What’s happened to him?” he asks. 

“We don’t know,” the older woman says. “But it happened on Okonishima.”

Zolf steps forward and the man rears back. Terrified. The woman says a stream of words in Japanese and the man shudders and nods, comes forward again.

“I can try to heal him,” Zolf says, and Sasano nods. “Does he know why he got sick?”

The woman speaks to him again and Hideto talks rapidly back. 

“He says everyone got sick. And then some of them got better but they were different. He saw the black start in his fingertips and he ran but it spread up his arm. So he cut it off.”

Zolf swallows, then nods at the man, who holds out his arm. “I need more light,” he says, and the woman unshutters the lamp. Around the ragged edges of the stump, red with the beginnings of infection, Zolf can also see lines of black, like thread. He swallows bile and reaches for his divine healing.

The stump is easy enough to deal with, clearing the infection and sealing the last of the poorly cauterised wound, but whatever the blackness is resists him. He pushes against it using all of his strength and finally, finally the last of the black retreats, but Zolf can still feel that hint of wrongness about the boy.

The boy straightens and brightens when Zolf releases him and babbles a stream of grateful japanese at him. Sasano smooths hair from his forehead and talks back to him, smiling.

“None of the others on Okonishima have returned,” the older woman says then. “We think they are dead. Even if they are still alive, we think they are dead inside.”

Zolf feels a chill in his stomach.

“How can we get there?” he asks.

#

When he gets back to the inn Sasano is much happier. “Thank you for healing my brother,” she says, and Zolf nods. He’d seen the family resemblance. “You have a powerful god,” she says then, indicating his feet. “The other healers could not stop the blackness.”

Zolf heaves a sigh.

“You’re certain the only way we can get to Okonishima is by boat. On our own?”

Sasano nods. “Hideto sailed home. With one arm.”

“Strong kid,” Zolf mutters. “Poseidon favoured him.”

“The only ships that go now are the ships with crates, from Damascus, but the crew do not get off and they are too heavily guarded to sneak on board.”

“Well it’s lucky I’m qualified for this part of the mission at least.”

Dawn is starting when he gets back into their shared room and Wilde is still asleep. Zolf knows he won’t be able to again so busies himself quietly packing their things. He keeps swallowing against a persistent bad taste in the back of his mouth. There was something familiar about the black streaks in Hideto’s arm, something just at the edge of his awareness that has unbalanced him.

“Up early,” he hears Wilde say and he glances across to see the other man, propped up on one elbow, watching him with a small smile.

“We may have a problem.”


	5. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I Pay for the Plot With Porn.

Oscar can feel the fear creeping at the edges of his awareness as they ride to Iiyama. Zolf had relayed what the woman on the farm had said _We think they are dead. Even if they are still alive they are dead inside._

Oscar thinks of people’s memories so altered that they are for all intents and purposes, dead, the person they were washed away by the manipulation of a force that doesn’t understand the basic rules of sentience, a force that doesn’t realise that choices, even bad ones, make people,  _people_.

Oscar thinks of people he’s known for years, turning cold and distant in communications from the Meritocrats, of orders that are contradictory, or make no sense, of corroded trust.

Oscar thinks of rows upon rows of metal figures in the dark of a warehouse and the slow, thumping steps of a creature that is pure evil, tasked to protect something he is beginning to think is beyond his own concept of the word.

Oscar remembers his dreams.

He can see Zolf watching him. There is no denying that the calm has drained away.

He bypasses the inn that Sasano suggests in Iiyama for one far more expensive in the western style, with wooden walls and beds instead of mats. It’s only one more day to Joetsu where they will try to find a boat and Oscar knows he won’t get the opportunity to ask for this again.

Zolf shuts the door behind him and he doesn’t even get time to finish his sentence “Wilde do you…”

Oscar pushes him into the nearest chair and climbs onto his lap, fisting both hands in Zolf’s hair and kissing him with all the fervour of a man drowning.

“Yes,” he says.

Zolf’s hands come up to his waist and he allows Oscar to kiss him again, open mouthed and greedy, before he pushes him back off the chair, gently, and sits him on the bed. Oscar lets out a needy whine but Zolf’s expression is stern and he holds up a hand. “Wait,” he says, and turns to fish around in his pack.

Oscar waits. When Zolf turns back around he’s holding a strip of cloth and a rope and Oscar leans forward, lips parted and breath quickening.

Two minutes later he is tied and blindfolded, kneeling on the bed. He can hear Zolf moving around, thinks he hears the sound of him undressing, yes, that was the thump of his boot, the rustle of his belt, but Oscar isn’t used to this, being unable to observe, and his instinct is to fight against it.

He flexes his hands, and shivers.

“Are you all right?” he feels Zolf’s hand stroke across his shoulders.

Oscar nods. He feels fingers curl at the back of his neck and Zolf pulls him close for a kiss. Oscar tries to dictate the pace, difficult without the use of his hands, but Zolf slows him down, parting lips gently and teasing with his tongue. Oscar chases after more, but Zolf bites down on his lip with his teeth, firm, just to the point of pain. Oscar groans and he feels Zolf smile against his mouth. 

“If it’s too much, you tell me, and we stop,” he says and Oscar can’t find words right now, so he nods instead. “Wilde?” 

“I’ll tell you,” Oscar barely recognises his own voice, it’s so ragged.

“Are you going to be able to do that?”

_“Yes.”_

“Good.” 

Zolf cups Oscar’s face in his hands and he feels Zolf’s lips press themselves against his forehead in a gentle kiss. “You’re doing so well,” he murmurs. “I need you to be still for me. As quiet as you can manage.”

Oscar nods. Zolf pulls back, but runs his hands down Oscar’s chest, feather light touches that raise goose bumps along Oscar’s skin. Oscar shivers, but finds himself focusing in on the feel of Zolf’s hands as they gently stroke and touch. The rest of the room falls away and Oscar can feel his thoughts and his fears receding so that all that’s left is sensation.

He’s hard, but it’s not urgent, or at least it isn’t until he feels Zolf’s fingers gently encircle him. He arches his back, and Zolf stops. Oscar feels hot breath on his neck as Zolf nips the join between neck and collarbone. “Still and quiet,” he says. 

Oscar nods again, shakily, and Zolf moves his hand again. Achingly slow, the lightest of touches, inching Oscar towards climax. He pants, twisting his wrists in their bonds, but otherwise stays still, and Zolf murmurs praise in his ear.

It feels like an age before Oscar starts to approach the edge and his arms have started to ache but he’s concentrating so hard on not making a noise as Zolf works him, a little faster now, enough that Oscar thinks he’ll be able to…

Zolf stops. Oscar whimpers and then he hears a small, rumbling chuckle from somewhere near his waist. He listens. He can hear movement and his ears strain. There is the quick rhythm of Zolf’s breath and Oscar _knows that sound_ and his brain supplies a picture to him of Zolf touching himself and he leans forward, wanting to take part, wanting to help.

“Still. And. Quiet,” Zolf says again, near his ear, and his voice is more rough, more ragged, and Oscar can feel the slight shake in the bed, feel the heat coming from Zolf’s skin. 

There is a grunt and a shaky exhale and _gods_ Oscar nearly comes at that as his brain provides him with a cavalcade of images of what might have just happened.

He swallows, then feels Zolf push him back onto the bed so his back is against the headboard, still kneeling. He can hear Zolf’s breath as he arranges Oscar on the bed, then he feels it on his dick and bites his lip, almost hard enough to break the skin, as Zolf’s mouth engulfs him.

Oscar has spent so long on the edge of climax that it takes virtually no time at all for him to come, spilling into Zolf’s mouth and shuddering with the effort it takes not to cry out. Then Zolf is on him, kissing him so he can taste himself, gently removing the blindfold and pushing him forward to untie the knots that have kept his hands behind him.

“You can talk now,” Zolf says, massaging Oscar’s wrists and hands to get the blood flowing back properly. “We’re done.”

Oscar blinks, then tilts his head. “You didn’t let me see you,” he says.

“Not tonight. But you… were a very pretty picture, Wilde.”

The warmth of that praise coils in his gut in a way that is different to how he felt two minutes ago, with Zolf murmuring in his ears. He isn’t sure he wants to examine exactly why. 

“You know I’m not afraid of hard work, Mr Smith,” he says instead, rubbing his own hands and accepting the glass of water that Zolf brings him.

“In this case you _did_ all the hard work,” Zolf responds. 

“But I didn’t get to see the results.”

“That was actually the point.”

Oscar runs his tongue along his bitten lower lip. The storm has receded. While he doesn’t feel as empty as he did after the first time, on the ship, he definitely feels more calm. When Zolf moves up behind him, though, and arranges him in the covers, Oscar is more than happy to relax into his arms, and he falls asleep astonishingly quickly.

He doesn’t dream.


	6. Dinner and Drinks

Wilde is awake before him then next morning, sitting at the small table in their room sipping tea over a western breakfast. Zolf sits up to see Wilde watching him over the rim of his cup. He’s fully dressed and there’s something different about him - the scruff of hair on his head that’s been growing out in the month on board ship is less of a fuzz, more shaped, and the plain clothes he was wearing on the ship now have touches of colour. His face looks less gaunt, too, cheeks rounded again with a touch of rose to them, and the dark circles that were under his eyes have disappeared.

“Feeling better, are we?”

Wilde smirks. “The hair was beginning to distract me,” he says.  _ Zolf remembers the feel of it, under his hands, as he cupped Wilde’s face to his and kissed him.  _ “And I’m going to have to use some connections in Joetsu in order to get a hold of the explosives we’ll need. Best to play the part.”

Zolf frowns. “Will it be safe? You said your connections have gone strange.”

Wilde shrugs. “Nothing out of Japan was compromised,” he says. “London, Prague, Europe generally has been a mess but Asia, not so much.” Wilde sucks at his teeth. “And this particular contact isn’t meritocratic.”

Zolf raises an eyebrow. “Not meritocratic?” There is a tightness to Wilde’s expression and he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Very much not,” he says.

“That doesn’t reassure me, Wilde.”

“I had to work with what I had, Mr Smith,” he says. 

#

They take the main road to Joetsu. It’s an easier and quicker journey than the route they’ve been taking through the mountains so far and Zolf notices that Ebisu is more sullen than he has been before now. Ebisu doesn’t speak any English, unlike Sasano. Ebisu rides slightly separate from the rest of them.

Ebisu, Zolf understands, does not approve of them at all.

When they reach Joetsu Ebisu immediately takes his leave, sorting out his contract with Wilde and accepting his payment. Sasano snorts as he leads his horse away to be fed and watered. 

“Always sulks,” she says to Zolf, grinning lopsidedly in a way that reminds Zolf of Sasha. He pushes down the small stab of hurt and worry. 

“Are you certain you want to come with us, to the island?” Zolf asks. Wilde is busy negotiating with the gate guards of the town, asking after a particular inn. “We don’t know what happened to your brother. It could be dangerous.”

“I need to see,” Sasano says. “Hateo is young. Brave, but stupid. If what is on Okonishima threatens us I want it gone.”

“Fair enough,” Zolf says. “We’ll definitely be glad of the help.”

She reaches out a hand and squeezes Zolf’s arm. “You… are  _ yoi,”  _ she says. “Good? With your god and your healing. You help. Are you sure about him?” she jerks her head towards Wilde, who has finished with the gate guard and is coming back towards them. 

“I’m not sure what you mean?”

“He looks at you. Like…  _ pazuru.  _ Valuable  _ pazuru.  _ Like treasure but…” she is struggling with the language. 

“Treasure?”

She is frustrated, and waves a hand. “I trust you,” she says, then shakes her head. “Not him.”

Zolf draws in a breath through his nose. “Well I guess you’ll have to trust  _ me _ to know that I know who I can trust,” he says. Sasano flashes him a grin that isn’t reassuring and Wilde indicates that they should ride towards the docks.

The inn they end up at is very much on the high end of the scale and Zolf, not for the first time, is thankful Wilde is footing the expenses for the trip. He still seems tense, however, despite the previous night’s activities, and Zolf touches his elbow on the way to stow their gear. 

“All right?”

Wilde gives him a tight smile that harkens back to how he used to behave, in London, and in Paris. The kind of smile that means he’s biting back something he knows he shouldn’t say. Zolf keeps looking at him and Wilde lets out a breath in exasperation.

“Probably,” he says, and Zolf frowns. “Look. This is going to be... awkward.” 

“Who is this contact?”

Wilde shakes his head. “He’s meeting us here. For dinner.”

Zolf cocks an eyebrow and Wilde gives him a withering look. “Don’t,” he says.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“I could hear you thinking it.”

They go down to the restaurant where Wilde has apparently booked a private room. As they walk through the public area Zolf notices that there are very few Japanese people here, and absolutely none who are not human. Zolf is used to being the only dwarf in any given place, his people are insular and prefer to stick to Svalbard and their mines but halflings at least are almost as common as humans in Japan and he sees none at all amidst the wealthy patrons gathered here tonight.

He frowns slightly as they’re seated in a small room off the side, lavishly laid for an extravagant meal. Wilde speaks briefly to the waiter in Japanese, and then they’re left alone, presumably to wait for Wilde’s friend.

“What is this place?” Zolf asks.

“Let’s just say that if Sir Bertrand had ever made it to Japan he would have felt at home here,” Wilde says. 

“So a frequent haunt of yours then,” Zolf says.

Wilde’s withering look from before intensifies. “I would have thought by now you’d know that I  _ don’t _ share the same…”

“Oscar!”

Wilde’s face alters completely at the sound of the voice. All visible tension drains away in an instant and Zolf almost gets whiplash by how quickly the Wilde he’s come to know over the past month disappears and the Wilde he had almost forgotten resurfaces, lips pursed and fingers curled near his chin elegantly as he turns his head.

Zolf follows Wilde’s gaze and is not surprised to see a willowy young man, dressed impeccably, who has one finger up in greeting and a wide smile on his full lips in the doorway to the private room. His face is all cheekbones and delicate jaw, with a casual wave of ginger hair and a light dusting of freckles across an aristocratic nose. 

Wilde gets to his feet and embraces the man. “Alfred, darling,” he says, and motions to the other chair at the table, the one closest to Wilde’s. “So good of you to come and meet me.”

The man, Alfred, Zolf presumes, arranges himself in the chair with all the grace and flamboyance Zolf would expect from someone of Wilde’s acquaintance. As he sits, he glances in Zolf’s direction, and Zolf knows he doesn’t imagine the slight hesitation, the tiniest of lip curls, before his attention is focused entirely back on Wilde.

Ah.

“What on  _ earth  _ have you done with your hair, Oscar?”

Wilde smirks and shrugs. “All the fashion in Damascus, at the moment, Alfred,” he says. “It does get so very dry and hot there, one wants some air circulation.”

“Damascus! Goodness you  _ do  _ get around. I’ve been stuck here for  _ months  _ what with all this business in London. Daddy is  _ quite  _ put out, or at least he was in his last letter. Have you had any news?”

“From London? No, haven’t been there in months. It does get so dreadfully dull in the winter. Did you manage what I asked?” Wilde says, the stream of chatter pouring from his lips as he leans forward and pours wine for the other man. 

“Well naturally,” Alfred says. “The crates are being stored in our east warehouse. I don’t quite know why you needed them shipped in my name rather than yours but you just need to pick them up. Did you manage to arrange a ship?”

“That was going to be my next big ask,” Wilde’s smile is dazzling and Zolf feels profoundly uncomfortable as he reaches forward and puts one hand over Alfred’s. Alfred, for his part, gives Wilde the same sort of smile Zolf can remember seeing on Bertie’s face, a lifetime ago in Hamid’s apartment.

Something sour curdles in Zolf’s stomach. 

“I know you’ve put yourself out so much already,” Wilde is saying, “but do you have any ships free currently? Something small would do. No crew necessary I’ve managed to employ my own.”

Alfred’s fingers curl around Wilde’s wrist and stroke the soft skin there _ that last night was rubbed raw by rope that Zolf tied, red marks livid against the pale skin until Zolf pressed his lips against it and murmured a healing word to smooth it over _ then glances at Zolf again, more critically this time, and while his expression remains pleasant his eyes go hard. Zolf stares at  him, unblinking, and one of Alfred’s eyebrows makes the slightest of twitches.

“Oh, I see,” Alfred says. “Dwarven sailors. How quaint.”

Zolf motions for a waiter to bring him whiskey, but says nothing.

Wilde doesn’t even blink, the smile widens, if anything, and Alfred shrugs. “We have a few smaller vessels, but if you’d just tell me where you’re going I can arrange…”

Wilde turns Alfred’s hand over in his and presses his other hand into the palm. “Alfred I don’t need anything other than the ship.” Wilde drags his fingers across Alfred’s hand, trailing to each fingertip delicately, gently. “I’ve already asked too much.”

Zolf watches Alfred’s throat move as he swallows. Sees him lean a little towards Wilde’s touch. There is a silence full of potential, before Alfred lets out a silvery laugh, then heaves a sigh. “Oh Oscar. You  _ know _ I can never say no to you.”

Wilde’s mouth curves.

Food arrives and Zolf busies himself with eating. Wilde and Alfred exchange pleasantries, talk about this British noble or that one. At one point Wilde excuses himself and Zolf is left sitting with a half eaten plate of beef and beans and a glass of wine that tastes sour in his throat and Lord Aflred Douglas sitting across from him, twirling the stem of his own wine glass in his hand and studiously not looking in Zolf’s direction.

He can’t do it though. He’s not as good as Wilde and he can’t sit there and not talk to someone when they’re looking directly at him. 

“Sooo,” Alfred says, finally, letting his eyes rest on Zolf’s. “You’re a sailor then? Should I be trusting you with one of my father’s ships?”

“Would you trust Wilde with one?” Zolf says, mildly, sipping at his wine. “He’s the one who hired me.”

Alfred’s smile widens. “Oh I’d trust Oscar with so many things,” he says. “I’m just interested in why he would have chosen someone so…” Alfred tilts his head. “Unusual, to be his companion on this quest.”

Zolf isn’t one for wordplay. Or any sort of play, to be honest. “I guess I have an honest face,” he says, shortly.

Alfred leans forward and rests his chin on his hand. Long eyelashes flutter against the sharp lines of his cheekbones. “Are you qualified?”

Zolf has grown, as a person. At least that’s what he tells himself, as he does not create water in the smug bastard’s face. 

“Cleric of Poseidon,” he says instead, gruffly, as though he  _ were _ simply the sailor that Wilde has hired. “Twenty years experience on the sea. Ten years experience working with mercenaries. You want someone to handle a ship,” Zolf licks his lips, “or a person, I know what I’m doing.”

“You’re not interrogating my captain, are you, Alfred?” Wilde says from the doorway, and Alfred sits backwards. 

“Not at all, Oscar,” he replies. Wilde walks past Alfred to his seat and lets his hand trail across the other man’s shoulders as he does so. Zolf takes another swig of whiskey, and realises that he may have had a few too many. “I have the perfect ship for you, if you’ll meet me at the east warehouse tomorrow morning.”

“Excellent,” Wilde says, scooping up his own glass of whiskey. “But I am afraid that we’re all tired after our long journey today. Shall we catch up tomorrow, Alfred?”

Wilde’s expression is mild, but Zolf can see a slight frown between Alfred’s brows at that. He stands, however, and offers a bow to Wilde, glancing at Zolf under his brows as he does so. 

“You did used to keep better company, Oscar,” he says, under his breath, but Zolf has good ears, and Zolf is listening.

Wilde brushes a strand of hair behind Alfred’s ear and leans forward to whisper in it. Zolf does not look. Does not try to listen. When he turns his face back, Alfred has left and Wilde is still standing, with the glass of whiskey in his hand, looking at the door.

Zolf does not want to examine the squirming mess of eels in his stomach right now so he downs the whiskey in his hand and stands up.

The noise startles Wilde, who turns and looks at him. His eyes are blank and so is his expression. Zolf blinks. He’s angry. He knows he’s angry and he knows absolutely why, but the way that Wilde is looking at him right now makes something else stir in his chest as he steps forward in concern.

“What is it?” he asks. It takes a moment, but Wilde blinks, breathing in deep through his nose and looking to the side. “Wilde?”

Wilde shivers like a horse shooing a fly and looks down at Zolf, and Zolf thinks Alfred must have cast something on him, must have done something to make him so…

“I’m fine,” Wilde says then, and there is an element of force to that, especially when it’s coupled with an unexpected hand in Zolf’s hair, at the back of his head, and Wilde tipping down the stupid amount of distance it takes for him to kiss him.

Zolf rocks upwards, steadying Wilde as much as he can with his hands on Wilde's hips and letting the kiss become heated. When they break away Wilde rests his head on Zolf’s, breathing deeply. 

“Do you need me to drown him?” Zolf says then and the breathless chuckle that Wilde lets out does something to Zolf, hits him somewhere that hurts but it’s a hurt he wants to curl around and treasure like a dragon with its hoard.

Wilde presses his lips to Zolf’s forehead and Zolf can feel them curved in a smile. “Some day,” he says, softly, as he straightens. “I think I’d like that very much.”   


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alex isn't the only one who can pick and choose from historical figures. You could google Alfred Douglas but long and short, he was Oscar Wilde's long term lover, the correspondence between him and Oscar was ultimately what landed him in jail. They lived together for a while after he was released, but after Oscar's death he renounced homosexuality as a sin and turned out to be a raging anti-semite, so I don't feel too bad about making him terrible here.
> 
> Yoi = Japanese for Good  
> Pazaru = Japanese for Puzzle


	7. One of Them

There’s only so long he can do it, Oscar realises, about ten minutes into dinner with Alfred. He thought it would be easy. He thought he could slip back into the days before he knew what Alfred was as easily as one adjusts one’s magic cuffs, as easily as one casts prestidigitation to cover a blemish, as easily as one manipulates a target for the greater good.

But Alfred came before he learned to compartmentalise properly and when he sees him framed in the doorway and slams the facade he’s been letting slip for the past month down over his face he realises there is a distinct time limit on how long he’ll be able to endure this particular part of the game and he’s going to be cutting it very, very fine.

He nearly chokes on a sip of whiskey when Alfred casually squeezes his thigh under the table. Instead he puts his hand over Alfred’s and squeezes back. Forces himself to sit there for another ten minutes before excusing himself to the restrooms, grasping the edges of the sink and breathing in ragged gasps over it, forcing down nausea.

He wants, very badly, to run. But he has a job to do so when his breathing slows he straightens, adjusts his tie and clicks his fingers. And he goes back out.

Zolf has his back to the door and Alfred has leaned in to ask him questions, a lazy gleam in the man’s eye that nearly sends Oscar back to the restroom.

_Oscar remembers his brother._

He can’t do this for any longer. Not tonight.

Alfred’s palpable disappointment that Oscar is not going to invite him up to his room would, from anyone else, give him a thrill of success. Instead, he just feels sick to the stomach. But he has a role to play and he touches Alfred the way he used to touch Alfred _before he knew what Alfred was_ and he whispers _tomorrow, love, I promise_ into his ear and the slight hitch in Alfred’s breathing nearly makes him retch and the hand that Oscar feels stroke down his back nearly makes him scream and the brush of Alfred’s knuckle across Oscar’s cheekbone is like an acid splash on his skin.

Alfred goes and Oscar blanks. He feels like he did in Damascus. Empty from exhaustion not from calm.

Behind him he hears Zolf stand up and he blinks, turning to look at him. He couldn’t think about Zolf, not while he was working Alfred, because Zolf was _the present_ Zolf was _after he knew what Alfred was_ Zolf _would have drowned him the moment he got a hint of what he was doing, damn proper processes and evidence._

“What is it?” Zolf asks, and it takes an effort not to open his mouth and spill everything he’s ever done, everything Alfred ever did, everything from _before._

Zolf is here, right now and Oscar kisses him to wash the taste of Alfred from his mouth and it’s not about giving in this time, it’s not about needing to ground himself, it’s about choosing something that he wants, for himself.

Choosing to be selfish.

Zolf kisses him back, although he makes a small “oomph” of surprise before reaching out to steady himself against Oscar. It’s good. Gods it’s good and Oscar feels desire curling sweetly in his gut that only surges stronger when Zolf speaks.

“Do you need me to drown him?”

 _I should have done it years ago,_ he doesn’t say. _That’s literally the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me,_ he doesn’t say.

“Some day,” he says, _today, now, right now_. “I think I’d like that very much.”

There is a cough from a waiter behind them. They’re blocking the doorway and he wants to clear their table. Oscar moves out of the way, keeping one hand on Zolf’s shoulder. 

“Are you still hungry?” Oscar asks and Zolf shakes his head.

#

Up in their room, Zolf pulls off his boots, frowning at his feet.

“Can’t you just… step out of them?” Oscar asks, feeling a little giddy with the relief of Alfred’s absence.

“Seems wrong to try,” Zolf says. “And it’d get salt all through the leather. Are you going to stop doing that?”

“Stop doing what?”

“You’re pacing.”

“I’m what?” He is, he realises. It’s been five minutes since they’ve come up to the room and Oscar feels like he’s been locked in a cage, and his feet are covering the same two squares of carpet as he moves back and forth in the room.

He stops and hugs his elbows. 

“What is it about him?” Zolf asks, gently enough, but Oscar winces. “What did he do to you?”

Oscar shakes his head, in a sharp no. “Nothing. He didn’t do anything to me. I…” _loved him once._ “We were involved,” he says. “A long time ago. He turned out to be… not very nice. So I left him.”

Zolf’s expression hardens. “Not very nice?”

“His father is the Marquess of Queensbury,” Oscar says. 

“Should I know who that is?” Zolf asks and Oscar blows air out his cheeks, perilously close to laughter. 

“Of course not,” he says. “You’re not aristocracy. Why would you?”

Oscar has said the wrong thing, he can see it in the way Zolf’s mouth works. “How am I supposed to tell one of you from the other?”

Oscar feels his lip curl _“Is dóigh leat go bhfuilim ar cheann acu?”_ he spits and then stops. Swallows. Zolf’s expression has turned from hard to puzzled. 

“Think of Alfred as Sir Bertrand with more brains,” Oscar says, after taking a long, deep breath. “And more connections. And a lot more money. And a propensity to cut down anyone in their way. My brother...”

“Your brother?”

Oscar nods, and sits, finally. He hasn’t thought about Willie for months. He isn’t even sure if he’s still alive in the mess that is London. Whether his mother is still able to care for him. Whether they have the money and the resources to survive.  

“So why is he so… cosy with you? Surely if he’s…”

“Alfred doesn’t know that I know about it,” Oscar says. “Alfred doesn’t know I’m a meritocratic agent. Doesn’t know a very great deal, to be honest, which is to our advantage, since he is the only person in Japan right now who can get us to Okonishima.”

“So your beef with Alfred is…”

“The Marquess did not approve of me,” Oscar says, precisely. “He believes that it is Alfred’s duty to produce an heir, and that I was… distracting him from that.”

“No reason the boy can’t…”

“The Marquess threatened my family. Beat my brother to a pulp. Told me he would do the same to my mother if I ever went near Alfred again. So I left him.”

“Hang on, if you’re talking to him now… Are you putting your family in danger by doing this?”

Oscar shakes his head, and his mouth twists in a bitter smile. “They’re under meritocratic protection, not that Alfred or his father knows that. My brother… never fully recovered. He needs constant care.”

“Alfred didn’t know about this, I take it?”

Oscar laughs. “No. I spent a long time convinced he was as heartbroken as I over his father’s… blindness. He wasn’t, though. I made an excuse and left for Cairo and he moved on.”

“You didn’t tell him about his father?”

“I didn’t,” Oscar says. “Didn’t see the point. No it’s not so much that the Marquess is a heavy handed idiot, it’s just that the apple didn’t fall as far from the tree as I’d thought.”

“Oh?” 

Oscar sighs. 

“One of my first jobs when I got back to London from Cairo was to help put down a pit fighting operation. They asked me to do it because I had a connection to the person who was running it.”

“Alfred.” Zolf looks like he’s swallowed something rotten. Of course Zolf knows about the pit fights. He spent time working as a Cleric in London, he would have had to heal the injuries, ask the hard questions that got only stony faced non-answers, he would have tried to convince the victims that no matter their debts, this wasn't a good way to clear them. He would have failed.

_“Oh you must come and watch with me, Oscar darling. It’s positively brutal. So exciting.”_

“He seemed very… taken with you?”

“He doesn’t know who I am,” Oscar says, and he rubs a hand through his hair and sighs. 

Zolf doesn’t ask but Oscar can feel the question between them, heavy and thick in the air. 

Oscar rests his elbows on his knees and shuts his eyes, hands cupped behind his neck, head bowed, looking at the floor, looking anywhere but at Zolf. 

“I don’t even know that I do,” he murmurs. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Irish translation:  
> “Is dóigh leat go bhfuilim ar cheann acu?” = “You think I am one of them?”


	8. Idiots

Zolf watches Wilde as he sits with his head bowed across from him, and contemplates _personality._ What are we, but a cobbled together mish mash of other people’s hopes and dreams, expectations and assumptions, memories and anxieties? How long do you have to pretend to be someone you are not before the pretense becomes reality?

“Do you need anything?” Zolf asks, because right now that’s the only thing he can do, the only tool he has to help Wilde through whatever this is, this crisis of _faith._

Wilde looks up and pulls his brows together in an expression Zolf hasn’t seen before, half confused, half fond. “I… no. Not that, at least.”

Zolf licks his lips. “Something else then?”

There is a long silence as Wilde continues to look at him. It should be uncomfortable, but it isn’t. Zolf can’t break away from Wilde’s gaze and doesn’t necessarily want to. “Something else,” Wilde says finally, and it’s a question, and it isn’t a question. Zolf can feel his heart hammering against his ribcage and they’re on the verge of something here, and it feels like falling into deep water, and it feels like stepping out into empty air over a deep ravine, and it feels like something utterly, inexplicably _inevitable._

The shattering of the window is so loud and so unexpected that Zolf misses where the smoke bomb lands. 

“Shit,” he swears, scrambling to his feet as he sees clouds of vapour start to billow up from behind the bed. “Wilde cover your mouth, don’t… don’t… breathe…” the edges of his vision start to go black and he can’t finish what he was going to say.

_Don’t breathe it in._

#

When he comes to he is tied to a chair. Whoever has done it didn’t know quite what to do about his legs, which are strapped down to the seat of said chair across his thighs with rope. Stupid of Zolf to have taken off his boots, in the room before the bomb went off, but the restraints across his thighs are still less of a problem than it would have been to be tied the way Wilde, opposite him, is tied, hands behind him, feet firmly secured to the legs of his own chair. He’s gagged, and it’s the same sort of gag they used on him in Paris, and Zolf feels a surge of anger at the pinpricks of blood he can see around Wilde’s mouth where it has cut into the skin.

Zolf isn’t gagged but his hands are very securely bound behind him. He looks around and sees that they’re in a warehouse, full of neat stacks of crates and equipment. At first glance he thinks they are alone, but some movement near the back of the room makes him focus and he can see a desk, the kind that an administrator would use to sort out inventory. Behind the desk, with his feet up on it and tipped back slightly on his chair, sits a man, idly picking at his fingernails with a dagger.

Zolf doesn’t immediately see the family resemblance. Alfred is a slender thing, long and lean, even slimmer than Wilde, but this man is massive. The fingers that hold the dagger are thick and blunt and Zolf thinks he can see a couple of the knuckles have at some stage been broken and badly healed. But his hair is that same shade of ginger, and his lips have that same full pout which on Alfred looked sensuous but here looks somehow obscene, as though Alfred’s mouth had somehow been transported and put on the wrong face, a face with heavy jowls and rough, red cheeks and a very clearly often-broken nose.

The Marquess of Queensberry, Zolf assumes.

“They say dwarves have the constitutions of oxen,” the man says, and his voice is as rough and gravelly as the rest of him. “But you went down like a sack of oats with a little touch of sleeping powder. Were you too distracted by your _pretty_ _friend_ , _”_ Queensberry says the word as though it is the worst insult imaginable “to even _think_ you might have enemies?”

Zolf presses his lips together, glancing to see if Wilde is showing any signs of coming around. He isn’t, but a stray glance up in the rafters makes his heart thud in his chest. 

 _Sasano._  

Queensberry swings his legs down off the table and stands, and he towers more than two feet taller than Zolf, even had Zolf been standing. 

“What do you want?” he asks, as mildly as he can manage.

“I want to know why this one,” he kicks Wilde in the shin, viciously, and Wilde grunts, head lolling. “Made my son ship five crates of high yield explosives to a backwater in Japan without informing me of what he was intending.”

“He didn’t _make_ your son do anything,” Zolf says. 

Queensberry backhands Zolf casually, and Zolf’s head snaps to the side as he tastes blood in the back of his mouth and hears ringing in his ears. “Tell me,” he says, standing in front of Zolf now so he cannot see Wilde. “What are _you_ to _him?”_

“Personal physician,” Zolf says, probably too glibly, and gets another backhand for his trouble. Zolf spits blood to the side. Zolf knows his most charming smile is at best, a grimace. But he gives it to the man any way. “What?’ he says. “He’s a fucking wizard. _Walking_ makes him ill. He pays me to keep him going.”

Queensberry shakes his head, then looks pointedly at Zolf’s legs. “I know who you are, Zolf Smith. Do not try to lie to me.”

“I wouldn’t bother,” Zolf mutters. _Keep him focused on me. Keep him off balance and angry. Keep Wilde alive._

Another slap.

_Plan’s working great, Zolf._

“You don’t have much of a repertoire,” Zolf pronounces the word very deliberately, around what he is beginning to think is going to be a missing tooth, unless he can heal himself before it actually falls out. He tongues it, trying to see beyond the Marquess, and manages to notice that Wilde is upright now, and his eyes are fixed on Zolf.

Zolf can’t talk to him. But he can keep the Marquess’ attention off him. “Did you ever actually fight in your pits?” Zolf says. “Seems a coward’s way out, to just arrange them and not get down and dirty with the commoners.”

The Marquess snorts. Cracks his knuckles. “Oh I fight in them,” he says. “And I always win.”

“Bet your lackeys drug your opponents,” Zolf says. Wilde is shaking his head, eyes wide, straining against his bonds. “Treated a few of them, you know, your fighters. Half of them are starving and the rest are weak and untrained.” He hears the drag of Queensberry’s breath, through nostrils that are flaring. Can sense how close he is to boiling over. “Easy. Pickings. For a _bully.”_

Queensbury stabs the dagger he is holding into Zolf’s thigh and Zolf lets out a grunt of pain as he feels it part flesh. It misses the artery, thankfully, athough it hurts like _fuck,_ but it also brings the Marquess’ face close enough for Zolf to be able to spit into it.

The Marquess stands up, leaving the knife embedded in Zolf’s leg, and pulls out a hankerchief, dabbing away the moisture. When he’s completely done, he moves behind Zolf, leans down and grasps the handle of the knife, and twists.

Zolf screams and Wilde makes a noise behind his gag. 

“What are you,” the Marquess says again. “To _him?”_

Wilde is rigid in the chair opposite, breathing through his nose in ragged gasps. Zolf shakes his head, panting with the pain. 

“Ask _him,”_ Zolf gasps out. He can’t see Sasano any more, which is a good thing. He hopes. Queensberry stands straight and walks to Wilde. The knife is still in his thigh, _Posiedon is it ever still in his thigh_ right next to the ropes that are tying him in place but the thought of trying to move it makes him want to vomit with anticipated pain.

Queensberry removes Wilde’s gag, then steps out of the way as Wilde spits. 

“How very common of you, Mr Wilde,” Queensberry says.

“Picked up a few habits over the years, you know how it is Johnny,” Wilde’s voice wavers slightly, high and not quite able to hide his fear. “All that rubbing up against the unwashed masses has left a bit of a stain on you too, hasn’t it?”

“Why is this warehouse full of explosives?” Queensberry says.

“Setting up for a party,” Wilde says. “Can’t be a party without a few good _bangs_. _Alfred_ always knew that.”

Queensberry slaps Wilde open handed just as Zolf hears a whisper of metal through air, and feels a thunk into the wood of the chair behind him. He reaches up with his fingers and finds a sharp edge, sharp enough to draw blood. He slowly begins to work the edge on the rope holding his hands.

“Why are you traveling with the dwarf? Where is the rest of his _party?”_

“He’s good with his hands,” Wilde says. “Doesn’t need a whole party for _that.”_

Queensberry slaps Wilde again and Wilde coughs. Zolf works his hands faster. 

“What if I just kill him, right now, in front of you?” Queensberry says, turning back to look at Zolf. Zolf’s hands are all but free. He slows down his movement so that Queensberry won’t notice.

“Please don’t,” Wilde says. “So hard to find good help these days.”

The rope snaps. It is too loud for Queensberry not to notice and Zolf has less than a second to grab the knife still in his flesh and pull it out before Queensberry is on him. Wilde shouts as the chair topples backwards and Zolf blindly lashes upwards with the knife, feeling it sink into Queensberry’s flesh.

Queensberry roars with pain and rage but doesn’t slow down, doesn’t seem weakened or even hurt. Zolf’s hands are slick with blood, his own and Queensberry’s, and as they rock on the floor, the chair cutting into his back and his legs Zolf feels those thick, blunt fingers close around his neck and begin, steadily to choke him. Zolf tries to cord the muscles in his neck and bucks desperately, trying to throw the other man off him, but his efforts make his head spin and black starts to creep at the edges of his vision.

He feels his fingers slacken on the knife buried in Queensberry’s gut.

There is a flurry of movement and the familiar sound of a blade cutting flesh, and Queensberry goes limp, collapsing with all his considerable weight on Zolf, who blinks rapidly to clear his vision before shoving him off with a disgusted grunt. Sasano is there with her katana drawn and she slices through the ropes still keeping Zolf tied to the chair before turning to free Wilde.

“Thanks,” Zolf croaks, then coughs, then grunts in pain, squeezing his eyes shut. _Fuck_ his leg hurts. 

He feels a hand on his shoulder, gripping tight and rolling him onto his back and looks up into Wilde’s face, set in anger.

“What the fuck was that?” Wilde says. 

Zolf blinks up at him, head lolling to one side and he feels strong, long fingers grip his chin and steady his face so he can’t look away. “Zolf, what the _fuck_ was _that?”_

“Distracting him,” Zolf says, and his head is still ringing from Queensberry’s blows.

“By letting him nearly kill you,” Wilde says. 

“Worked.”

Sasano nods. “Good job,” she says, wiping her katana clean.

“You’re both insane,” Wilde says, then reaches down to stroke cool fingers across Zolf’s temple and he hears a small snatch of melody, followed by the touch of magic in his head and leg. _“You’re_ supposed to be the cleric,” Wilde says when he’s done.

“But you’re so pretty when you sing for me,” Zolf says, or thinks he says, before he closes his eyes to rest for a while.

“Idiot,” Wilde says, but in Zolf’s ears it doesn’t sound like an insult. 


	9. Trust

He looks up from healing Zolf to see Sasano watching him, one eyebrow raised. “You two are cute,” she says in Japanese, and Oscar raises an eyebrow. 

“How did you find us?”

She toes at the corpse of Queensberry. “Sticks out. Thinks he can do anything he wants without people noticing. Heard the window break, then followed him.”

“He didn’t carry both of us here on his own,” Oscar says.

“Two guards. Dead now.”

“Thank goodness for efficiency,” Oscar smooths a hand through Zolf’s hair. “How long have we been here?”

“Three hours,” Sasano says. Zolf starts to stir, trying to sit up and Oscar puts a hand on his shoulder and gently pushes him back down.

“On your back, soldier,” Oscar says, absently.

“You say the nicest things,” Zolf mumbles. Oscar sighs, then holds his hands out over Zolf’s head again and starts to sing. He’d thought he might be able to get away with only a small amount of healing, but Queensberry has obviously shaken something loose with all the hitting, so he pulls on the full force of his magic and lets himself be  _ heard. _

When he’s done he helps Zolf to his feet. Sasano is watching him with calm, dark, eyes and Zolf has gone quiet and still, hand still in Oscar’s.

“What?” he says.

Zolf clears his throat. “Thanks,” he says, and gives his hand a squeeze before dropping it. “Did Alfred know about this, you think, Wilde?”

Oscar looks at the corpse of Queensberry and back at Zolf. The fact that he’s dead, that the man who orchestrated the ruin of his brother is  _ gone  _ isn’t registering.

“It’s possible,” he says. “But the fact that he isn’t here makes me think that he doesn’t.” 

“So you think we can still get the ship out of him?”

“If he turns up and finds the corpse of his father he will probably hesitate,” Oscar says. 

“Easily fixed,” Zolf says, and nods to Sasano, who grabs Queensberry’s ankles. Zolf gets his shoulders and they manage to wrangle him out of the warehouse and throw him in the water, while Oscar prestidigitates the bloodstains from the wood.

He hears the splash, and he still can’t believe that Queensberry is dead, he half expects the man to shout and rise up out of the water like some sort of spirit, so he’s relieved when Zolf and Sasano both come back inside. “Pity I couldn’t drown him,” Zolf says and Oscar feels a high pitched laugh try to escape from his throat. “Poseidon would have liked that one.”

“Next time I’ll only kill him a little bit,” Sasano says. “I got rid of the bodies of the guards before I freed you.”

“Good," Zolf says. "Should be about six hours till dawn."

“You cannot return to your hotel,” Sasano says.

“No,” Oscar says. “I think we have to assume it’s not safe there.”

Sasano nods.

“Our things are there,” Zolf points out. “Weapons, gear. We’ll need it on the island.”

“I can collect them,” Sasano says. “If the two of you will be safe here?”

Oscar glances at Zolf, who shrugs. “I think we’ve killed the problem,” Zolf says. “But we can do a scout of the entire building to make sure.”

They do that, Sasano slipping in and out of shadows as Oscar and Zolf find a back storeroom, obviously meant for use by the workers, with a couple of cots and some blankets. They don’t find any other employees, or guards, and Oscar comes to the conclusion that Queensberry had intended to do to them what they had ultimately done to him. A quick murder, a body in the water.

He shudders. 

Sasano confirms that there aren’t any others in the building and Zolf and Oscar set themselves up in the storeroom, the door open so they can see most of the warehouse. “I’ll be back before dawn,” she says, and is out the door, leaving Oscar looking at Zolf.

“All right?” Zolf asks, then frowns, approaching and reaching up to cup Oscar’s mouth in his hands. A quick prayer and some healing magic and the slight ringing in Oscar’s ears disappears, and the wounds around his mouth are gone. “He got you pretty good a few times there as well,” Zolf says, thumb stroking the skin near Oscar’s mouth. 

“Mmm hmm,” Oscar says, but he’s distracted by the feel of Zolf’s fingers on his skin. He remembers the look on Zolf’s face, in the hotel room, before the bomb, and suddenly finds it difficult to catch his breath.

Zolf seems to realise he’s touching too much, being too fond and his hand stills but Oscar cups it before he can pull away. “Provoking Queensberry was probably the stupidest thing you’ve ever done,” he says.

Zolf snorts. “Not by a long shot,” he says. “There’s a reason I’ve got no legs.”

“Yet you’re still such an upstanding fellow.”

“Don’t start.”

Oscar turns his head and presses his lips to Zolf’s palm. “We can’t afford to mess this up,” he says. 

“Good thing Sasano has a brain then,” Zolf gently tugs his hand away. “We should try to sleep. I’ll keep a watch.” But he doesn’t move. The moment stretches out. Oscar feels unbalanced, unsure and adrift. He doesn't like the feeling.

“I’m not a moron, you know, Zolf Smith,” Oscar heaves a breath. “This is not an ideal situation and tensions are high and we have an… arrangement. One which has been so far very satisfactory, thank you.”

“Going posh and formal is a defense mechanism for you, isn’t it?”

“Shut up,” Oscar says, but he can’t quite stop the smile. “And yes, of course it is.”

“So what is it you’re afraid of?”

“Oh, so many things,” Oscar laughs. “New and interesting things that I’ve never been afraid of before.”   


“This is a journey of personal growth for you then? Nice for some.”

Oscar feels frustration boiling up from his gut. “Why did you do it?” he blurts. “You didn’t need to provoke him like that, he would have been distracted enough with me, he would have… you didn’t need to… I’ve seen what he…”  _ did to someone I loved. _

Zolf blinks at him. “He would have  _ killed _ you,” he says. “He didn’t know me from a bar of soap. The only reason he was even bothering to hurt  _ me _ because he thought it would hurt  _ you.. _ .”

“I was right there you could have let him…”

“Posiedon’s soggy _arse,_ Oscar, I’m not going to sit there and let someone hurt you when I have the power to stop it!”

Zolf is breathing hard and has his fists clenched by his sides and Oscar is really trying to comprehend the words that he’s said, trying to line them up in his head in a way that makes sense.

“He nearly…”

“I  _ can’t,”  _ Zolf says. “I can’t let anyone else take my place. Not again.” Zolf growls under his breath, then shakes his head. “No. You’re not doing this. You’re not… you’re not allowed to put yourself in the way of what I know is right. I just fucking wish people would…” Zolf shuts his eyes, shakes his head again. “I wish you would trust me for once.”

“I thought you knew that I did.”

“Obviously not,” Zolf rubs the heels of his hands into his eyes. 

Oscar bites his lip and cross his arms over his chest. He doesn’t know how to make this right. He doesn’t even know what has made it wrong, somehow, aside from the fact that watching Zolf get hurt  _ because of Oscar  _ sent him into a spiral of panic that hasn’t quite receded, that the idea that Queensberry could take more from him had never occurred to him before the moment when he woke up to see Zolf spitting blood and provoking the most dangerous man Oscar had ever known, and that it was  _ Oscar’s fault  _ he was probably going to die and he hadn’t even worked out what Zolf meant to him and it was  _ important, vital, necessary that he do that as soon as possible. _

“What do  _ you  _ need?” he asks, low and soft. Zolf looks up at him, one eyebrow slightly raised, incredulous.

“That wasn’t the point of the arrangement,” he says.

“It’s beginning to look like it needs to be part of it, from where I’m standing at least,” Oscar says, trying to keep his voice calm. 

“We should  _ sleep  _ Oscar,” Zolf says, and he sounds so very, very tired, but Oscar also can’t help but notice the sound of his name on Zolf’s lips and perhaps... perhaps that is enough, for now.

“Think about it,” Oscar says. “And I’ll take first watch, I spent more time unconscious than you did.”

“Tied to a chair and gagged,” Zolf points out.

“As you well know, not something that is always unpleasant for me,” Oscar says, smiling. 

Zolf stares at him for a long moment, and Oscar gets the impression he wants to say something, but like Oscar, right now, he simply cannot find the words.


	10. Sleepless

They set up in the storeroom, and Oscar… and _Wilde,_ uses his magic to circle the warehouse with an alarm, before he sits in a chair facing the doorway, obviously determined to take first watch. Zolf would object but he is. So. Tired. He cannot remember being as tired as he is right now. He knows it’s not just because of being tied to a chair and beaten half to death, the mess of feelings in his chest, the endless loop of thoughts about Wilde, about the mission, about the state of the entire fucking _world just won't stop_. He turns with his back to Os.. to Wilde and he tries to shut his eyes and _Poseidon_ if he could cast sleep on himself he’d do it but he can’t.

“You’re not fooling anyone,” he hears Wilde’s voice, after about ten minutes of resolutely not moving and keeping his eyes tightly shut. 

Zolf flops onto his back and stares at the ceiling for a full minute. Now he can't even close his eyes.

_This is fucking stupid._

He sits up and looks over at Oscar in his chair. The man has his ankle crossed over his knee and the chair is tipped back on two legs, rocking in a gentle rhythm. He glances over at Zolf and gives him an indulgent smile.

Zolf can remember hating the _sight_ of him. He can remember desperately wanting to _drown him in a bucket._ He can remember wanting to wring his pretty neck over the Bertie article, he can remember _headbutting him_ and enjoying the satisfying crack of bone against bone even if it came at the cost of Bertie’s fist.

He can remember _all_ of that.

But.

But there is a _problem._  

The problem is that Oscar Wilde is... beautiful.

The problem is, Zolf has always known that. The problem is, Zolf has spent the last week (the last month, the last ten years)  trying to stop himself from getting attached to another person he will inevitably fail, and instead, he’s failed himself. 

“You should sleep first,” Zolf grunts out. 

Wilde shrugs, then holds out one hand. Zolf can see the shake in it from across the room. “If you can’t, I rather think I won’t have any better luck.”

Worried, Zolf gets up and goes to Wilde, taking the hand that was shaking in one of his then cupping Wilde’s face. The chair falls to four legs with a solid thump. “You’re not in shock,” he’d checked when he’d healed Wilde before. 

“No, just very highly strung,” Wilde says, leaning his face into Zolf’s hand and letting out a soft breath. “At least that’s what they’re always saying at Covent Garden.” He looks up at Zolf with that fucking cheeky grin of his and Zolf growls under his breath.

“Six hours till dawn,” Zolf says.

“Five and a half now,” Wilde replies. “And the alarm will last two.”

Zolf could go back and try to sleep. He could leave Wilde in here and take a walk in the cool night air, try to clear his head, try to settle the storm of thoughts that won’t let him relax. 

Instead, he leans forward and kisses Wilde.

The problem is he never thought Wilde would turn out to be a decent human being. Oh, he could be working for the meritocrats, he could be nominally on the side of good, but Zolf always had a compartment in his heart that had people who care about others and people who care about themselves and until Wilde had shown up, humbled and desperate on his ship, he’d always put Wilde in a different box to his own.

Wilde’s lips are soft and pliant under his and Zolf shifts forward as Wilde’s hands settle on his hips, tugging him closer. This is not part of their arrangement. This is not Wilde needing to ground himself so he can function, this is _affection_ and _gentleness_ and _comfort_ and Zolf feels his breath hitch and his eyes sting and something dangerous loosen in his chest as he kisses _Oscar Fucking Wilde_ and it feels something akin to _home._

“Gods,” Oscar says as he pulls back, a tiny laugh falling from his lips.

“At a loss for words?” Zolf says.

“Oh, never,” Oscar replies, and starts working on the buttons of Zolf’s shirt. “But there are so many better uses for a clever tongue.” Zolf tips his head back and lets out a groan as Oscar starts to use said tongue, fingers shucking Zolf’s shirt as he presses his lips to Zolf’s skin.

Zolf lets Oscar get rid of the rest of his clothing, then watches as he strips down. He can’t help but admire the delicate pink flush under Oscar’s skin and Oscar chuckles, tipping Zolf’s head up for another, lingering kiss, before they arrange the blankets from the cot on the floor.

Zolf ends up on his side, with Oscar curled around him possessively, trailing kisses up and down the line of his spine, one long fingered hand slowly working his dick. It’s sensuous, and slow, and utterly unlike anything they’ve done before now. When Zolf comes it’s almost silently, a stutter of his breath that sounds like a prayer. Oscar bites into his shoulder when his own climax takes him, then sings a scatter of words Zolf does not understand into his skin that take away the unpleasant dampness painting Zolf’s back.

“What language is it?” Zolf asks, when he’s caught his breath. Oscar’s hands, which have been tracing patterns up and down Zolf’s side, still for a second. 

“Irish,” he says. 

“We all thought you were a wizard,” Zolf says. “I know Hamid did.”

Zolf feels a puff of breath against his back and Oscar’s fingers go back to their gentle wandering. “Hamid studied under the most prestigious teachers in the world,” Oscar says. “And paid appropriate tuition fees for the privilege.”

“Well yeah, his parents are loaded,” Zolf says. “But…”

“A bard will teach you for a few coppers or a good meal,” Oscar interrupts. “Or if you can’t manage even that, there are always other services one can exchange.”

Zolf presses his lips together, then shifts to his back, frowning at Oscar, who props his head up on one hand and raises an eyebrow. “Do you have a judgemental speech prepared? I know Poseidon can’t quite hold a candle to Zeus but he is hardly on the same level as Artemis when it comes to matters such as these.”

“No,” Zolf says, softly. “Not here to judge anyone. I’m just…”

“Mmm?”

“Sorry.” Oscar reaches out and tugs at a lock of Zolf’s hair, right beside his temple, curling it around his finger, seemingly fascinated by it. 

“I chose a path,” Oscar says. “I followed it through.” He gives Zolf a dazzling smile, the same smile he'd turned on them, so long ago (not long ago at all) sitting in his ridiculous suit in Hamid’s apartment. “And now I’m here.” He leans forward and presses his lips to Zolf’s temple. “Sleep,” he says. “I’ll reset the alarm.”


	11. Sea Legs

Oscar knows how to go without sleep.

He’s always known. Since he was a boy in Ireland, lying awake in the dormitories at school, listening for the tell-tale step of the other boys - the ones who disapproved - the ones who _hurt because they could._

When his mother’s marriage fell apart and they were forced to flee to England, wary and frightened in his hammock on ship, trying to shush his sister who had already begun to sicken.

And then there were the weeks before Damascus, where his fatigue had scraped at his insides like something alive and writhing, desperately trying to force its way out of his skin. 

He lets Zolf sleep through the night. Gods know Oscar isn’t going to be any use as a sailor once they get back onto the water and he doesn’t feel weary, not in the ways he has become accustomed. 

Sasano gets back to the warehouse with their gear an hour before dawn. The slight ping in the back of his mind when his alarm goes off startles him out of contemplation, but he nods in relief when he sees her approach the storeroom.

“What if the Marquess told his son?” she asks, dumping their gear in the corner. Zolf is stirring, and Oscar starts rifling through his pack for the makings of breakfast.

“Then we’re going to have to kill him,” Oscar says. “A contingency I was planning on,” a contingency, if he is honest with himself, he would prefer. “If you could…” he indicates the food, then goes to reset the alarm. When he gets back Zolf is dressed in his gear, chainmail and mace, chewing on whatever Sasano has made for breakfast. Oscar checks his crossbow. 

“Please don’t shoot yourself with that again,” Zolf says, and Oscar grins at him. If he’d not ended up half naked and poisoned in Zolf’s cabin... well. He thinks he can see something of the same thoughts cross Zolf’s mind and they share a smile.

 _“Sickeningly_ cute,” Sasano says in Japanese from where she is checking her sword. 

“She keeps saying that,” Zolf says. “She won’t tell me what it means.”

“If you ever tell him what it means he’ll probably drown you,” Oscar says in Japanese and she barks out a laugh. 

They leave the warehouse and take up watch opposite, waiting for Alfred to arrive.

He turns up an hour past dawn, in an ornate carriage. Oscar feels oddly blank as he sees him step down and enter the warehouse. He has used up all his panic, apparently, and Zolf’s gentle squeeze on his arm barely registers. 

Sasano slips away to make sure Alfred isn’t laying traps for them and comes back ten minutes later, indicating that he is alone in the warehouse.

Alfred is standing almost exactly where his father died, head tilted slightly, and the light hits him in just the right way for Oscar to catch a glimpse of the man he might become, ten years, twenty years down the track, without the influence of his father.

It's not his business to have hope for Alfred's redemption though. Not any more.

Alfred looks up as they enter and Oscar begins to arrange the smile on his face.

Alfred’s expression, however, is not fond, or pleased. He holds a sheet of paper in one hand and his perfect bow of a mouth is twisted in a pout.

“Alfred?” Oscar says, hesitant.

“Oscar,” Alfred says, “I’m so sorry. I’ve been called away. Father seems to think I’m needed in London. After _years_ of hassling him to leave this wretched place! Of course he had to choose  _now_ to tell me. I’m to leave for Tokyo in an hour.”

Oscar raises an eyebrow, and glances at Zolf. 

“Any particular reason?” he asks. 

“Something utterly dreary to do with the meritocrats,” Alfred says, rolling his eyes. “I _did_ manage your ship, though. The Black Swan, mooring bay twelve. My men will have the crates shipped directly to you but you’ll need this...” he comes up to Oscar and tucks the piece of paper into his breast pocket, dragging his fingers along Oscar's lapels as he does so. “I very much wanted to deliver it personally.”

Oscar reaches out and takes Alfred’s hands in reassurance, pressing them both up to his lips.

It feels familiar, and easy, and only very subtly wrong. Alfred tilts his head up to him and gives him the old smile and Oscar can almost remember what it had been like to love him.

“It’s fine, Alfred,” he says. “I’m so sorry you’re leaving. Please give my best to yours in London?”

“Oh of course,” Alfred says, then tugs Oscar forward to kiss him lightly on the lips.

Oscar makes himself return it. 

“With any luck I’ll be back in London within the month,” Oscar says to him, grazing Alfred's cheek with one knuckle.

“Something to look forward to,” Alfred says, then steps back. Oscar sees his eyes land on Zolf and a muscle work in his jaw. “Do be careful on your journey.”

Alfred leaves, and Oscar notices Zolf has crossed his arms over his chest. He smiles and Zolf glowers at him.

“Could have drowned him,” he says.

Oscar dabs at his mouth with a hankerchief, gives a low chuckle. “Well if we ever see him again he’ll probably have put two and two together with regards to his father,” he says. "And in that case, please do not hesitate."

#

The process of transferring the crates to the ship they will take to Okonishima is straightforward enough. Oscar has no knowledge whatsoever of ships, but it does seem very small, especially with the crates crammed into every spare inch of space, and Zolf seems uncharacteristically cheerful as he directs Alfred’s staff in the correct way to secure them.

“A week,” he proclaims, once the others have departed. “We’ll have to sleep on deck and anchor each night, but it shouldn’t be a problem.”

Oscar had known it wouldn’t be a fast trip, but he cannot help but chafe at delays, especially when they come with absolutely no way to know whether Hamid and the others are alive. He has a sudden itch to be back in his office, an urge to be in the familiar, with something resembling a network of informants, with the comforting drudgery of paperwork only occasionally interrupted by the antics of the agents under his care.

 _Look after yourself,_ Azu had told him, up on that mountain, and he’d told her to stop caring, as though she could ever even know where to begin to try doing something so alien to her nature. 

 _If you keep doing this you’re just going to die,_ Grizzop had said, and he’d calmly accepted that the goblin was probably right.

“A week then.”

#

It’s completely different to the journey from Alexandria. The weather holds, thank the gods, (Oscar doesn’t whisper any extra prayers to Poseidon, he figures Zolf can do that for all three of them). As the sun starts to set each evening they turn back into shore and anchor the ship for the night so Zolf can rest. Sasano and Oscar alternate watches while he sleeps and catch up on their own rest during the day.

They don’t have time to talk, but in some ways that is a relief. There is a rhythm to it. Wake, work, rest, and each night, after Oscar finishes his watch, he settles down to sleep next to Zolf in the nest of blankets and bedrolls they have made between crates of explosives, under the stars. 

It feels more like home than anywhere has in years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Logistics ate my entire ass on this chapter, sorry for the delay. It's a bit of an interim one for the very good reason that I do Not Know How to Sail. TIME SKIP!!


	12. Landfall

They make landfall on the side of the island at dusk on the final day, concealed as much as they can be with illusion magic. Unloading the crates and hiding them takes them until the middle of the night and Zolf is exhausted when they’re finally done. A week of solo sailing will do that, he figures, as he sits with his back against one of the crates to catch his breath. 

They’re concealed in a tiny cove with an overhanging cliff that has just enough space for the crates. Getting to the centre of the island is going to be Sasano’s job, with help from an invisibility spell of Oscar’s, so he has time to rest.

He watches as Oscar casts and Sasano vanishes, gnawing his lip in worry. She reminds him of Sasha, and Sasha is in Rome, or worse, and the ever present low key worry he’s been carrying since Prague is pressing on him more now that they’ve reached their destination.

Oscar comes back to him and frowns when he sees that Zolf isn’t asleep. Zolf waves a hand, indicating… everything and Oscar nods, sitting down next to him. 

“Sasano knows what she’s doing,” Oscar says.

“Doesn’t mean I’m not going to worry about her,” Zolf says. 

“Fair.”

They wait.

She returns an hour later, looking troubled.

“Problem?” Zolf asks.

“There is no one here,” she says. “Warehouses, full of the things you described. But no people. No alarms. No security.”

Zolf can see Oscar’s throat move as he swallows. “A trap?”

Sasano spreads her hands. “For you?” she asks. “Who knows that you know about this?”

“I didn’t tell Alfred where we were taking the ship,” Oscar says. “The only other person who knew we were going to Okonishima was…”

“My family,” Sasano says succinctly, “would _not_ betray us.”

“There’s also Ebisu,” Oscar says, looking grim.

Sasano sucks in a breath. “I would say too stupid,” she says. “But I have been wrong about people before.” 

Zolf grinds his teeth together. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a trap,” he says. “We came here to do a job.”

Sasano shrugs. “So we do the job,” she says, and starts opening the first of the crates.

#

The island is tiny and the facility takes up most of the land space in its centre. From what Oscar described of the facility in Damascus, Zolf can see that this one is different. Only two buildings - one warehouse full of the simulacrum chassis, and one other, larger building that at first glance holds nothing at all. 

They plant the explosives around the warehouse and the building, a combination of alchemist fire and something else that Zolf doesn’t recognise. 

“Draconic,” Oscar says when he sees Zolf’s curiosity. “Extremely rare, very expensive, and utterly classified. Apophis set me up with some after Damascus, he knew we’d need to do this in more than one location.”

“I thought you said you didn’t trust the meritocrats any more?”

“As a rule, no,” he says. “But Apophis was always the most invested in the destruction of the simulacra. I trust him more than the others.”

“As long as they work.” 

Oscar looks grim. “Oh, they work,” he says, then focuses on the larger building. “Are you certain it’s empty?” he asks Sasano.

“Nothing in there,” she says. “No people, no equipment.”

“We need to be certain,” Zolf says, and Oscar nods. Sasano shrugs and they push open the door. 

Inside there are bare floorboards and nothing else. Zolf frowns as he steps onto the wood, a ripple running up through his foot that feels… wrong. Each step he takes into the room increases the sense of wrongness to the point where he stops and turns, looking back at Sasano and Oscar, who are standing just inside the doorway. 

Something is moving on the floor. Something dark and liquid, oozing up from between the gaps in the wood, and reaching towards them.

Zolf blinks. Remembers the blackness in Hideto’s arm. The sense of something corrupted and utterly alien. “Get out,” Zolf says. “Out - get out of here _now!”_

Sasano doesn’t hesitate, turns and runs. Oscar looks at him, confused, and Zolf can see a tendril of darkness reaching towards his boot. “Oscar, _run!”_ Zolf starts to run at the same time, feeling a jolt of something like pain in his feet with every step. There is a sickening, liquid sound, sucking and slurping all around them and Zolf can see black rising out of the floor like a living shadow, clumping together.

He screams as pain lances up through his legs, sees Oscar escape through the door and stumbles through after him, suddenly unable to keep his footing. He feels hands under his arms, dragging him away from the building, and looks back to see blackness billowing inside.

“What _is_ it?” Sasano shouts. She is the one half carrying him. Zolf cries out as he tries to walk, his feet, his _god given feet_ on _fire_ with pain. 

“Doesn’t matter what it is,” Oscar says, “we need to get to the safe zone.”

“Can’t,” Zolf gasps out. “Can’t wa…” pain stabs through his feet again and he almost screams. Sasano curses in Japanese and bodily lifts him, running with him on her back while Oscar runs next to them. There’s no time for subtlety. Zolf can see the darkness roiling out of the building, through the cracks in the doors and the windows, even through the walls. It’s gaining on them. “Oscar. Now. Detonate _now!”_

“We’ll be caught in the…”

Zolf is already murmuring the prayer, hands moving. He throws up the barrier and shouts. _“DO IT.”_

The world goes white.

The pain of his feet makes it difficult to maintain his hold on the barrier and the sheer force of the explosion almost breaks through, but Zolf grits his teeth and bears down on it, _willing_ Poseidon to come through. The noise is deafening, but even over the noise of the explosion Zolf can hear the shrieks of the thing - whatever it was - screeching in pain and anger. He can feel his grip slipping on his divine magic and he opens his mouth, screaming his own frustration and fear and pain into the maelstrom, lost amidst the chaos and churning fire.

It feels like time stops.

When it starts again they cannot see more than a foot around them. Smoke and debris clog the air. Zolf’s feet are still hurting, although it’s nothing like the agony he felt when he was trying to walk on them, and he looks down. 

Tendrils of black curl in the water of his feet, twisting and slithering through them like eels.

“Oh,” he says, swallowing, and Oscar turns to him, sees where he is looking and sucks in a breath. “Fuck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm channeling Alex right now. I hope you all still respect my craft.  
> ALSO I AM AWARE of the mechanics of explosives in Pathfinder but having spent more hours than I should sifting through bard spells I'm gonna handwave that Apophis can magically bottle his breath because this is fanfiction and I'm beginning to hate Pathfinder as much as Ben does (I HAVEN'T EVEN PLAYED IT FFS).


	13. Faith

Oscar breathes in air that feels like it is baking his lungs and wipes at his eyes, willing himself to believe that he’s not seeing what he’s seeing in Zolf’s feet. The black tendrils are alive and malicious, but they are contained, for now, as if there is an invisible barrier around where Zolf’s watery ankles are. They are continually attempting to reach higher, at least that’s what it looks like, but each time they reach upwards they recoil as though they have met with some kind of resistance. 

Zolf’s teeth are gritted with pain and he is clutching at his knees. Wind is snapping around them and it’s not safe here, not with fire and debris swirling every which way. “Can you carry him again?” Oscar asks Sasano, and she looks pale and shaken, but she nods. Oscar helps her heft him up onto her back and Zolf grunts in pain as they start walking through the desolation back towards the ship.

“What are they?” Oscar asks Zolf.

“Stuff that affected Hideto,” Zolf gasps out. “I pushed it back with healing but something…” he grunts… “something else… the legs? They’re Poseidon’s gift I think…” he cries out again. “Fucking  _ hurts. Gods.” _

They get down the cliffside to where the ship is moored. They’re somewhat sheltered from the dust and destruction here, the overhang of the cliff and the sea wind keeping the worst of it at bay. Zolf is now panting in ragged breaths. The dark coils in his feet are thrashing even more violently now and Oscar makes Sasano set him down on the sand. 

“You said healing worked on Hideto?” Oscar says, and Zolf nods tightly. Oscar shrugs and holds his hands over the legs, and starts to sing.

Zolf screams.

Oscar chokes off on a phrase. “What… what is it?”

“No. Not… Can’t. Doesn’t work on the legs. Divine magic. Need to…” Zolf shuts his eyes and bashes his head on the sand in frustration. Oscar clutches at his shoulder. 

“Don’t…  _ Gods  _ Zolf don’t hurt yourself just tell us…”

“The water!” Zolf chokes out. “Get them into the ocean. Contact. Closer. Closer to Posiedon.”

Oscar glances at Sasano, who shrugs and picks Zolf up again. They both wade into the softly lapping waves. The water is cold, but not unbearable, and when they’re up to their knees Zolf clutches at Oscar’s arm and nods.

They lower him in and Oscar immediately feels the tension drain from Zolf’s body. “Keep me here,” he says, voice ragged from screaming and fire. “Don’t… don’t let go.” 

Zolf’s eyes roll back in his head and he goes limp.

“How long are we supposed to do this?” Sasano says.

Oscar has rarely felt so utterly bewildered and lost. He shrugs, shifting his weight between his feet as the waves rock them all. She frowns. “Do you have him?”

Oscar nods and he kneels down in the water, cradling Zolf by his shoulders with his head against Oscar’s chest, keeping his head above the water while his legs and lower body are below. Zolf’s breathing is uneven and Oscar can feel his heart beating rapidly under his skin.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” he whispers.

#

He is on the driftwood boat. The ocean around him is rough, but not stormy, the kind of weather that would provoke seasickness in landfolk but is par for the course on the open ocean. Comforting, in its way, if it weren’t for the fire in his legs. 

The boat has a layer of water in its bottom, and Zolf is standing, or at least, that’s what he thinks at first, until he looks down and sees that his feet have become black tentacles. They coil and writhe around the bottom of the boat, reaching up its sides. Zolf can sense their malevolence and has to fight down panic, resist the urge to fall on his arse and attempt to scoot backwards and away from them.

He cannot. They’re attached to him. They’re  _ part of him. _

The boat gives a mighty heave and Zolf loses balance, his legs will not obey his commands the way he expects - they are tentacles now, after all, and he is dumped over the side. 

He should have been dumped into water but the moment before he goes under the tentacles swarm up and encase his body and head and instead he’s plunged into still, dry darkness, the feel of coal dust under his nails and making his eyes gritty and sore, the knowledge of tonnes of rock and earth above his head pressing in on all sides. 

_ Gods, no. Not this. _

It’s not fair. He can barely remember Feryn’s face but he can remember the  _ smell  _ of the damned mine, the  _ sound  _ the beams made as they cracked. He can remember the brief, cut off scream and the feel of earth under his fingers as he frantically dug to try to reach his brother.

He’d lain in bed, night after night, for  _ years, _ imagining what it must have been like for Feryn, alone in the dark, knowing he was dying. He’d always told himself it was probably quick, a delusion he’d been willing to live with until Paris, until it had been him, trapped and alone and breathless under the earth.

He opens his mouth to scream and dirt fills it, pushing downwards, spreading through his lungs, infecting him,  _ invading him _ .  _ I’m in water _ , he tells himself. He  _ knows he is in water.  _ He knows that back out there somewhere Oscar is holding him in the sea, keeping his head above the surface, keeping him  _ safe _ . He reaches out desperately, trying to feel the touch of sea and salt, desperate for anything that isn’t dust and dirt and death.

_ Posiedon now would be a really great time to lend a dwarf some divine favour,  _ he thinks, as hard as he can. It’s not much of a prayer, but he never was one for words. 

There is a rushing sound in his ears and he is flung forwards and down, water surrounding him once again, dim light illuminating the tentacles that are once again flailing at the end of his legs, somehow washed free of his face. He slides down what feels like a pipe before being shot out into nothingness.

He almost panics again, thinking this is earth, but it isn't. It's utterly black, at least he thinks that at first, but after a moment he can see pinpricks of glowing light, delicate filigree patterns of impossible feathery creatures swimming through the ink black depths of the deepest part of the sea. 

He has never felt so completely known.

He knows this is a dream. He knows that it is  _ absolutely _ real. He remembers the feel of water in his lungs, the panic of losing people he loves, but underneath that, in his heart, he remembers the touch of Poseidon in his soul. 

_ You had faith in me once,  _ he thinks.  _ I should have kept faith in you for that alone.  _

He looks down at his legs, and they are the legs he was born with, flesh and blood and latticed with black veins. He looks at them again and they are gone. He looks at them again and they are clear, swirling water, purged of the blackness, shaped by divinity.

He feels the rush of water around him and his head breaks the surface to see the face of Poseidon above him shaped in stormclouds, and for the first time in his memory it does not look angry.

“Thanks,” he says, and Zolf can almost imagine he sees a smile.

#

Oscar sits in the water for what feels like hours. At one point Zolf begins to thrash in his arms so violently that Oscar has difficulty keeping him anchored, flailing and calling out what sounds like a name, before stilling once again. His breath goes alarmingly shallow and Oscar has to resist the urge to pull him out of the water and start healing him again, but the steady, rapid thrum of his heart doesn’t change under Oscar’s hands and the black tendrils do not advance any further up his legs. 

“Come on,” Oscar mutters under his breath, as Sasano waits anxiously on the shore, ready to take over from him if he gets too cold. Oscar’s teeth are chattering but he won’t go back in, not yet, just a little longer.

Zolf’s back arches and he draws in a long, deep breath. Oscar grips him tighter as his eyes open.

“Oscar?” Zolf says. 

“Zolf,” Oscar says. “You all right?”

Zolf lifts one leg out of the water and Oscar sees it is free of black tendrils. The tight band of terror that's been wrapped around Oscar's chest loosens. “Yeah,” Zolf says. “Yeah I think I might be.”


	14. Enough

As far as they can tell, picking over the ruins and scorched earth of the facility, nothing usable remains. The beast, or whatever it was, made of blackness, has dissolved, although here and there on the ground they find patches of what looks like oil. When they find the first of them Oscar insists that Zolf go back to the ship and get his boots, and Zolf complies, more because he’s touched that Oscar cares than because he’s worried he’ll get himself infected again. The smears are obviously dead. He can sense no malice in them, or see any hint of what they might once have been.

“You said the paperwork talked about Japan being the place they dealt with fluidics,” Zolf says. “Do you think that’s what it was?”

Oscar shakes his head. “I don’t know,” he says. “I don’t know… nearly enough. We need to get back to Cairo. There’s… there’s so much more we need to find out.”

They sail back to the mainland, but not to Joetsu. Oscar isn’t interested in returning Alfred’s boat and Zolf can see no reason why they need to prolong the trip back to Cairo any more than necessary.

“What about the kill switch?” Zolf asks. 

Oscar shakes his head. “Grizzop expects to find it in Japan,” he says.

“Bit of a ways for them to come get it if this whole thing is urgent.”

Oscar looks a bit disgruntled at that and Zolf raises an eyebrow. “They have a tame teleporter,” Oscar explains.

“What, another wizard?” Not  _ another _ wizard, Zolf reminds himself. Hamid isn’t a wizard. Hamid is descended from a  _ meritocrat. _ Tiny, loyal,  _ faithful  _ Hamid is going to be a dragon when he grows up. 

Zolf resists the urge to rub his eyes. 

“He’s not part of the… he’s not under contract with them. But he helps when he can. Getting to Tokyo and back won’t be difficult for them the way it is for the rest of us mere mortals.”

“Helps to have friends.”

Oscar gives him that dazzling smile and Zolf wonders at which point exactly it stopped being annoying and started being something he would miss if it were taken from him. “Demonstrably.”

They make landfall near Hiroshima and scuttle the boat. Sasano bids them farewell to go and rejoin her family, although Zolf half has it in him to offer her work before he remembers that he’s not a mercenary any longer and pulls up short. Oscar hasn’t been paying him for his help. To be fair it didn’t even occur to Zolf to ask. Sasano, seeing his hesitation, gives him a quick, awkward hug and shakes her head. 

“I will be here,” she says, and Zolf nods.

“If you happen to see the others…” he begins.

“If they turn up in Japan they will stick out,” Sasano says. “A goblin, an orc, a human and a halflng,” she gives that half smile that always reminded him of Sasha. “Sounds like some sort of English joke.”

Zolf snorts. “Well. Tell them I’m okay. Tell them to be careful.”

She nods. “I will.”

They book passage to Africa. Oscar thinks it will be safer to work North overland back towards Cairo. News from Europe has been sketchy and all of it bad, crossing overland through China is far too dangerous, and Oscar is too well known to land back in Egypt directly, especially now he no longer resembles the haggard wreck of a man who had walked onto Zolf’s ship back in Alexandria. 

The passage will be a long one. As long as it took them to get to Japan in the first place, and they book a cabin together on a larger passenger vessel, one where it will be easy to be lost in the crowd of other travellers, provided Zolf keeps his boots on and Oscar keeps his wit in check.

There are two cots. It’s a bigger room than the one Oscar had on the Aurora, more opulent and luxurious. Zolf can’t help thinking that it’s the first time he’ll be a passenger on a ship and not a crewman, and wonders if he’ll go mad with boredom.

He could always offer himself up to assist, he supposes. And there is also Oscar’s small library - something Zolf hadn’t even realised he’d lugged all the way across Japan.

“Did you really pack these on the passage to Okonishima,” Zolf says, running his fingers over their spines after Oscar set them on the small shelf provided in the cabin. Oscar chuckles and comes up behind him, reaching past him to slip the copy of “A Picture of Dorian Grey” out from its place at the end of the row. Zolf has an urge to lean backwards into Oscar’s embrace that he resists, at least until Oscar trails the fingers of his other hand across Zolf’s shoulders.

“I never took you as much of a reader,” Oscar says.

Zolf, whose heartrate has skipped up a notch, presses his lips together and shakes his head. “Spent a bit of time in prison,” he says. “You’ll do anything to pass the time.”

Oscar presents the novel to Zolf, who takes it, skeptical. “I’m not usually one to promote my own work…” Zolf cannot stop the short bark of laughter at that “but you might find it amusing. I have been told I should be more direct in my prose, but I’ve never been one to take ten words to say something when I can say it far more prettily in fifty.”

“Prettily,” Zolf says, flatly, but he takes the book, and looks up at Oscar, who is smiling down at him. 

Zolf swallows. “Look… I…” Oscar raises an eyebrow. Zolf feels a surge of the old anger in his chest, then remembers his arms around his chest in the water, his face when Zolf told him to detonate. He remembers that Oscar  _ trusts  _ him. “I don’t know what this is, really,” he says, finally. 

“This?”

“You. And me. Whatever… whatever it’s becoming. It… it doesn’t feel like the arrangement any more.” Oscar slips his hand down to Zolfs and tugs him towards the closest of the cots, sitting down and urging Zolf to do the same.

“No. I think we’re a little beyond that particular arrangement now, aren’t we?” 

“I dunno. Really. I mean. Do you still  _ need _ it? Should I be…”

Oscar laces his fingers with Zolf’s and Zolf suddenly doesn’t have the capacity for words. “Do you think,” Oscar says, each word carefully chosen, the way all Oscar’s words are carefully chosen (except the ones he babbles in Zolf’s ears when he has let himself go, except the ones he says when he lets himself be seen, except the words Zolf is increasingly thinking no one aside from Zolf gets to hear) “what we did was only in service of my… distress?” 

Zolf swallows. He doesn’t think that. But he can’t let himself articulate it. “I…”

Oscar cups Zolf’s cheek and turns his head towards him. “I am widely regarded as someone incapable of being sincere,” Oscar brushes his thumb over Zolf’s cheekbone. “So if I said to you that you mean more to me than any arrangement, that I would be devastated if you decided you no longer wished to travel with me, that your help, both appropriate and somewhat salacious, was not invaluable to me in all of my capacities, I would fully expect you to assume I was lying.”

Zolf lets out a short humph of frustration, torn between wanting to lean into Oscar’s touch and, oh yes, there is that urge again, to drown him in a bucket.

He wouldn’t do it. Not now.

Probably not ever. 

“I think we’re beyond assumptions,” he says, instead, roughly, and Oscar gives him that grin again, and it’s stupid and unthinkable and outrageous. But it’s enough. 

It’s more than enough

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND THAT'S ALL FOLKS at least for this little leg of the journey. I'll be waiting on more canon Wilde content before I continue this particular saga but there may be one-shots. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING AND COMMENTING this has been so much fun for me. The community around RQG and you guys in particular are a shining light, please never change.  
> ILU ALL.


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